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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/24922618">Marked in Trust</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/Marchling/pseuds/Marchling'>Marchling</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Fast &amp; Furious (Movies)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Soulmates, Angst, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Past Child Abuse, Slow Burn, Soulmate-Identifying Marks, Trust Issues</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-06-26</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-10-03</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-04 05:20:24</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Mature</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>19</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>75,666</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/24922618</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/Marchling/pseuds/Marchling</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Seventeen year old Brian O'Conner was sure of two things: </p>
<p>1) Going to juvie was worth it if it meant he never had to see his father again. </p>
<p>2) He never wanted to meet the person who matched his Soulmark. </p>
<p>Everyone else in the world might have believed Soulmarks were an amazing thing, that the one person their Mark matched was meant to be their great love. Brian didn't, he knew better - Soulmarks were just a way to trap and ruin someone and he wasn't going to let it happen to him. </p>
<p>Meeting his Mark, Dominic Toretto, wasn't going to change anything about that. He wouldn't let it. It didn't matter if Toretto tried to do to win him over, Brian wasn't going to fall for it. </p>
<p>Really, he wasn't.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Brian O'Conner/Dominic Toretto</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>993</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>1776</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>1. Chapter One</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>This story is written in an alternative timeline where everyone has a soulmate that is matched to them by a mark on their body. </p>
<p>I hope you enjoy it and please let me know what you think!</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <hr/>
<p>
  <strong>Chapter One</strong>
</p>
<hr/>
<p> </p>
<p>Brian wasn’t sure what it meant when a judge handed down a sentence of nearly two years in juvie and it felt like a gift. Probably wasn’t a good thing but still, it was a fucking <em>gift</em>. Yeah, he couldn’t be around cars or Rome but in return for missing those things he got three meals a day and no contact with his father. Even Rome himself would call it a more than fair trade.</p>
<p>So he went in; no fight, no trouble.</p>
<p>They took his clothes and gave him a uniform. Fine.</p>
<p>They ran down the rules, pretty much what he expected. Fine.</p>
<p>They gave him a cell with a roommate who didn’t seem to want anything to do with him. Fine.</p>
<p>They asked him about a thousand questions about his home life, his education and his medical history and he answered honestly sometimes and more creatively otherwise. He didn’t get the sense they cared too much either way. Fine.</p>
<p>They catalogued his Soulmark and asked him if he knew who he matched. He didn’t and they wrote that down too. Fine.</p>
<p>They took him down to medical and gave him the world’s quickest physical. Fine.</p>
<p>Then, they brought him down to his cell and his indifferent new roomie and left him the fuck alone.</p>
<p><em>Bliss</em>.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>---</strong>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Brian made it almost a year, right to his seventeenth birthday, with no incidents. Some guys talked shit but there wasn’t really enough left that mattered to him to make it worth fighting back. What did he care about their words about his dead mother or asshole father? If they got at him for being a shit carjacker, what did that matter? He was better with cars than they would ever be and if they meant he was shit because he got caught… well, wasn’t that why they were all there? A pretty hefty percentage of them, hormonal jackasses with no outlet, make the usual comments that Brian got for his hair and his face but he could keep his head down and his dead eyes staring long enough to get most guys to back down.</p>
<p>All in all, juvie didn’t suck.</p>
<p>So getting called into the warden’s office out of nowhere kind of threw him for a loop.</p>
<p>Brian walked in slowly and darted his eyes around while the warden and the guard who brought him exchanged a few words. For a few awful minutes on the walk up, he had almost thought his father had come for some supervised visit or something. The room was empty though, or at least empty of people. There were files and framed certificates and all sorts of shit filling the man’s office. None of that mattered, though, as long as he got no visitors.</p>
<p>“Brian, please sit down.” The man said when the door closed. He gestured widely to the seat on the other side of his desk and Brian sat on the first cushioned chair his ass had graced in months.</p>
<p>“My name is Edward McConnell and I run the center. It’s very nice to meet you, although I’m glad our paths haven’t crossed yet, right?” The man chuckled like he’d said something funny.</p>
<p>He didn’t offer his hand up for a shake.</p>
<p>He also didn’t wait for Brian to speak before he barreled on. Brian wasn’t sure when he’d last opened his mouth to say something but it was probably coming up on months.</p>
<p>“So I’m sure you’re curious why you’re here today.” McConnell said, “Especially considering you’ve been a model team-member here.”</p>
<p>
  <em>Team-member. For fuck’s sake. </em>
</p>
<p>This time he paused, like Brian was going to thank him for his “compliment”.</p>
<p>Instead, he stared.</p>
<p>The man cleared his throat, “Well, I’m sorry for the backlog, you realize that obviously we can’t always find matches and especially not always in a timely manner. Not everyone gets registered… well, there are a lot of reasons for things taking so long. For the most part we would just report the matches to the parties involved but you’re a very lucky young man, Mr. O’Conner.” He paused and grinned like Brian was supposed to be happy about whatever he was rambling about, “Considering your model behavior and your match’s willingness to take you on, you’re going to be leaving us by the end of next week!”</p>
<p>Brian sucked in a confused breath, shock radiating down to make his fingertips tingle. “W-what?” He choked out, his unused voice catching on the word.</p>
<p>McConnell stared at him. “Which part are you questioning?”</p>
<p>“All of it!” Brian wanted to yell but he knew better.</p>
<p>“Your match? Your Soulmark?” McConnell said slowly, like Brian was really dim.</p>
<p>
  <em>No… no... </em>
</p>
<p>“What are you…” Brian said faintly, his voice giving out halfway through the sentence. This couldn’t be what McConnell was making it out to be. It just couldn’t. Finding his Mark was second only to seeing his father again in terms of things Brian didn’t even want to imagine. His hand strayed to the inside of his forearm, up by his elbow, where the mark was hidden by his sleeve.</p>
<p>“Didn’t you get your Soulmark catalogued when you got here?” McConnell asked, his eyes going a little wide at Brian’s continued confusion.</p>
<p>“Yeah, b-but…”</p>
<p>“What did you think we were going to do with it?” McConnell questioned. He held his hands out and laughed, “Of course we work to find matches, the same as hospitals do. Not regular adult institutions, of course, but for young kids like you where a match could turn everything around…” He trailed off and shook his head, “Well, the point is we found your Mark and we contacted…”</p>
<p>“<em>What?”</em> This time Brian straight up yelled.</p>
<p>The guard outside the door popped his head in, “Is everything all right, Mr. McConnell?”</p>
<p>“Yes, yes, just some confusion.” McConnell said, waving the guard away. The door closed again.</p>
<p><em>This cannot be happening.</em> Brian felt a strange sort of tremor build up under his skin. Staying in juvie was just fine by him. No way in hell did he want to leave early and do it in the custody of some Soulmark who had to be crazy or sex-starved to want some juvenile delinquent enough to take him out of a fucking detention center.</p>
<p>McConnell watched him carefully, “All right, so this appears to be a shock to you. I’m sorry no one explained what the Soulmark cataloguing was for explicitly.” He said this a little more gently, like he was genuinely taken aback by how Brian was acting. That didn’t make it better.</p>
<p>“So that’s just it? I go with some stranger?” Brian asked.</p>
<p>He knew the question was stupid. It wasn’t like juvie was his choice either, at least in their eyes. So what if they forced him into one place or another? One jailer for another?</p>
<p>McConnell winced at the phrasing, “It’s not quite like that, Brian. Of course there are requirements for the both of you.”</p>
<p>“I refuse.” Brian said firmly.</p>
<p>He didn’t think it would work. He didn’t have any illusions that they cared. He was a minor and he was a criminal. They didn’t give a shit. He just wanted to say it. He wanted this man to know that he was forcing Brian into this sick bullshit.</p>
<p>“I don’t know why you’re so against meeting your match, Brian.” McConnell countered. “Maybe this will make you feel better,” He said with a fake grin. He opened a folder on his desk and slid it across to Brian.</p>
<p>There was a picture attached to the top corner of some sort of printed profile. As soon as Brian registered what the man was trying to show him, he turned his head away.</p>
<p>Awkward silence filled the room.</p>
<p>McConnell cleared his throat for what felt like the twentieth time. How had he only been in this room for five minutes?</p>
<p>“Well, let me just read you some of this, then.” He said quietly. Papers shuffled and he spoke louder, “Dominic Toretto, age twenty-three. Born and raised in Los Angeles. His Mark matches yours perfectly. We further confirmed from him the date that his Soulmark came and it matches your birth date and time. I know you said you were born with yours, so all of that is pretty standard for the age difference between the two of you. He’s currently the owner of DT’s Garage and Toretto’s Market, both in Los Angeles… Doesn’t that sound nice, Brian? I know you like cars.”</p>
<p>Brian didn’t answer.</p>
<p>There was another awkward shuffle of papers, “Of course your suspended license still stands. You won’t be able to drive again until you’re eighteen. But still, you can work on the cars in the meanwhile. I’m sure your Mark would be happy to let you.”</p>
<p>
  <em>Let him. </em>
</p>
<p>He stood up, done. “When?” He barked.</p>
<p>McConnell stared at him like he was a particularly stupid puppy, “By the end of next week,” He said and Brian knew he was repeating it from before. “You’ll be meeting him tomorr-”</p>
<p>“No.”</p>
<p>McConnell stopped abruptly. Brian knew he thought he was crazy. Who wouldn’t want to meet their soul mate? The person supposedly made for them? It was a load of shit, though, and Brian knew it. He wanted no part of it. He wanted nothing to do with Dominic Toretto.</p>
<p>“Are you sure you want to refuse the meeting, Brian? This is the person you’re going to spend the rest of your life - ”</p>
<p>“Will it change anything? If I meet him and don’t like him?” Brian asked. He knew the answer, just like he knew that he wasn’t spending the rest of his life with that man. The next eleven months, apparently, but sure as shit not his life.</p>
<p>McConnell sighed, “No, it won’t. Especially since I think you’ll just say you don’t like him after two minutes whether it’s true or not.”</p>
<p>Finally this guy was catching on.</p>
<p>“I really want you to think this over, Brian. There are hundreds of boys in this building that would kill to have this chance. For all the matches that we find, most aren’t eligible for release like this. I honestly thought that was why you’ve been so good.” He said, sounding more genuine than he had yet. “I’ll give you an hour or two to reconsider the meeting tomorrow before I call it off. If you change your mind, flag down one of the guards.”</p>
<p>Brian wouldn’t and they both knew it.</p>
<p>“Just to make sure you really understand the timeline of events here, I’m going to spell it out for you.” McConnell continued, “If you agree to meet him, that comes tomorrow. The day after you’ll be given the full list of requirements. We do this in advance so you have time to think it over and ask any questions necessary. Processing will take up the rest of the time and you can use it to ask us anything. By next Friday, you’ll be escorted out of here by your Mark to live with him.”</p>
<p>There was so much that Brian wanted to say to all of that. The hateful things he wanted to fling at this man burned in his throat. He wouldn’t give him any more satisfaction.</p>
<p>When Brian didn’t speak, McConnell sighed again and called for the guard.</p>
<p>“Remember Brian, if you change your mind about meeting him, get word to me in the next two hours.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>---</strong>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>He didn’t change his mind.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>---</strong>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>The “requirements” were a fucking joke.</p>
<p>They pretty much boiled down to a lot that Brian was expected to do and virtually nothing on his precious match’s end. Mostly, Toretto had to agree to feed Brian, not beat him into oblivion and not fuck him until he was eighteen. Considering there was apparently only going to be “a couple of quick spot checks” in an entire year, Brian figured Toretto would be able to work around most of that if he did it all behind closed doors.</p>
<p>Brian’s were longer but they mostly boiled down to “obey”.</p>
<p>He glared down at the strange swirled mark on his arm, something he normally avoided looking at with everything in him.</p>
<p>He wasn’t going to last a week.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>---</strong>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>The night before he was due to be released, the solution came to him out of nowhere. It was so simple he burst out laughing in the middle of the cafeteria.</p>
<p>“What the fuck you laughing about, pretty boy?”</p>
<p>Brian grinned and turned to the guy who had said it. Derek was a few inches taller than Brian but outweighed him by probably thirty pounds. He was mean and he was easy to provoke. After all, just Brian laughing had annoyed him.</p>
<p>He was perfect.</p>
<p>“Your nasty mug is what I’m laughing at.” Brian countered. It was a stupid insult.</p>
<p>It was enough.</p>
<p>Derek shoved back his chair and stood, stance wide and ready for a fight. Brian kept grinning.</p>
<p>If a perfect record was what got him out of juvie and into the care of some so-called soul mate, then Brian would wreck that record in a heartbeat.</p>
<p>He stood up too, ready.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>---</strong>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Bruised ribs.</p>
<p>A cut on his head that had needed to be glued shut, which he’d had before and knew that it was going to itch like crazy soon enough.</p>
<p>His knuckles were barely bruised. The nurse had noticed.</p>
<p>Once she was finally done poking him, he laid back in the bed and felt the pressing anxiety that had been burying him since McConnell had sold him to his Mark slowly start to ease.</p>
<p>Maybe the whole situation was a favor in disguise. Now he knew the name of the person he needed to avoid the most. If this guy was LA for life, then Brian might even get the fuck out of California after he was done in juvie. He wasn’t going to end up like <em>them</em>. He wasn’t going to let some Soulmark ruin him.</p>
<p>He went to sleep easier than he had in days. He had a way out and a plan to keep it that way.</p>
<p>
  <em>It’s going to be okay. It’s going to be okay. It’s going to be okay…</em>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>---</strong>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>When he woke up the next morning with the sun was shining and a bald guy was staring at him.</p>
<p> </p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0002"><h2>2. Chapter Two</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <hr/>
<p>
  <strong>Chapter Two </strong>
</p>
<hr/>
<p> </p>
<p>Brian blinked slowly and turned his head to stare back at the stranger at his bedside. The guy’s eyes were intense and he looked at Brian in a way he couldn’t really interpret. He looked big and strong and mean and kind of hot in ways that Brian could <em>definitely</em> interpret. A fellow <em>team-member?</em> Probably not, he looked too old for it. If Brian were in regular prison then it would have been a sure thing.</p>
<p>“You plan on saying anything?” Brian said quietly.</p>
<p>“Good morning.” The guy answered. His voice was a low rumble, deep in a soothing kind of way… if Brian were the kind of person to find another human being soothing, that was.</p>
<p>Brian raised an eyebrow and hoped that conveyed enough <em>‘who the fuck are you, creeper?’</em> to get some sort of answer.</p>
<p>The guy smiled just a little and it softened his face away from the hard edge that made him look like a prisoner. That wasn’t to say that Brian wasn’t still damned sure the guy could beat the shit out of him if he was so inclined. He just looked less inclined to do it when he smiled.</p>
<p>The smile didn’t make him and his staring any less creepy, though.</p>
<p>“Figured you could guess.” The guy answered Brian’s unspoken question.</p>
<p>When Brian didn’t seem to catch on, because he <em>wasn’t</em> catching on, the guy tilted his arm. His long-sleeve white shirt kind of made his tanned skin glow and Brian’s dumb ass got stuck on that before the truth slammed into him.</p>
<p>Dominic Toretto.</p>
<p>His Soulmark.</p>
<p>Brian jerked forward in the bed and rolled out of it without paying any respect to his busted up ribs. It hurt so bad his eyes stung but the more important thing was getting away.</p>
<p>“Whoa,” Toretto said as he stood up and held his hands out. “Take it slow.”</p>
<p>Brian’s whole body was tensed up and waiting for a fight, “What the fuck are you doing here?”</p>
<p>“Taking you out.” Dom said, voice low. He kept his hands out in the open, palms up, as if Brian was some dog that needed gentling. It only made him angrier.</p>
<p>“For good behavior.” Brian said. His voice cracked when he said it and it made him even angrier. “Not so good after last night.”</p>
<p>“Thought so.” Toretto said. He looked at Brian in a way that made him feel too exposed. He hated it.</p>
<p>“Thought <em>what</em>?” He snarled.</p>
<p>Toretto sat back down in his chair and stared at Brian some more. “Why don’t you sit back down? Before you fall over.”</p>
<p>Brian stood. He’d stay standing for as long as he had to deal with this <em>visit</em>. His head turned around what Toretto had said… <em>Taking you out.</em> It couldn’t be. He was going to be let out for good behavior. He’d gotten his ass handed to him for it. There was no way they were letting him still go after the fight he had started.</p>
<p>Toretto looked so sure.</p>
<p>Brian felt his lungs tighten up as the reality of the situation set in.</p>
<p>Not only had his plan not worked, now he was going out there with this tank of a man and he was busted to hell. Brian had gambled and he had fucking failed.</p>
<p>“Just breathe.” Toretto said quietly. “Sit down. I’ll go get a nurse.” He stood again slowly and stayed on the far side of Brian’s little corner of medical.</p>
<p>Brian gasped and swayed but he stayed standing. He wouldn’t do a single thing that man asked him. He would make the year hell. He would make him regret taking Brian out of juvie.</p>
<p>He would be glad to let him go when the year ended.</p>
<p>Brian bit his lip, angry with himself. There wouldn’t be any <em>let</em>. Here he was, matched for four minutes, and he was already thinking like a slave. He wouldn’t let Toretto tear him down. <em>He wouldn’t.</em></p>
<p>“Mr. O’Conner.”</p>
<p>McConnell came around the curtain with a big smile on his face. Brian saw it tighten at the sight of him before it straightened back out to that truly amazing level of fakeness.</p>
<p>“You said,” Brian ground out, “That you would only let me out for good behavior.”</p>
<p>The other man gave him a smile so pitying it almost made Brian snarl angrily at him. If he wasn’t so off his center, he would have.</p>
<p>“This isn’t my first year on the job, Brian.” McConnell said, like Brian was the stupid one. Apparently he was. Apparently he was like years and years of stupid kids who were too fucked up to want their Marks and tried to get out of it by breaking their gold star record.</p>
<p>Looming just outside of the curtained partition, Brian could see Toretto standing and listening. A nurse’s heels clacked down the hallway towards them. All these people, pitying the stupid kid.</p>
<p>“I don’t want to go,” He said again loudly. He knew it didn’t matter. He just wanted Toretto hear it. He stared hard at him through the curtain, desperate to see a flinch or some kind of reaction. He got nothing. Toretto stayed still like stone.</p>
<p>“Well, Brian, you’ve made that quite clear but I’m sure when I get the report from your first check in you’ll be singing a different tune.” McConnell answered. “Dominic and I are going to give you and the doctor a little space for a final check over and then you’ll be on your way.”</p>
<p>Brian tore his eyes from Toretto and kept them away from McConnell. He didn’t want to meet the man’s eyes and see whatever was there. He figured his rage was pretty visible even without eye contact. McConnell rubbed his hands together kind of awkwardly before he left without another word.</p>
<p>
  
</p>
<p>
  <strong>---</strong>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Toretto had a nice car.</p>
<p>He made damn sure that he didn’t react to it, especially since the guy was watching him like a hawk. Still, if he could get two minutes alone with the thing, he’d be set.</p>
<p>They got in the car; all of Brian’s worldly possessions fitting in a shitty black backpack that someone had provided him. He didn’t have much but then he didn’t need much so it hardly mattered. If they had let him, he’d of taken his uniform with him, just to make a point.</p>
<p>Toretto pulled out of the parking lot without a word to Brian, which suited him just fine. He didn’t seem like a chatty guy. What he did seem like was a guy that, when he lost his temper, he lost it in a quick explosion of violence. Brian had no doubts this guy could put him into the ground if he wasn’t careful… and careful had never really been his strong point.</p>
<p>For all that he preferred they not talk, the silence in the car wasn’t a comfortable thing. He could feel every ounce of tension and it made him fidgety. He tried to keep it hidden by fiddling with the strap of his backpack down against his right leg so the movement was out of sight but he got the feeling that Toretto had noticed. It made him feel closed in and that feeling just fed into the tension.</p>
<p>Normally nothing got through his cool but this car ride was one of his worst nightmares come true. His head said <em>cut yourself some slack</em> but the rest of him said <em>weak weak weak</em> in the beat of his pounding heart.</p>
<p>“So we’ve got some stuff to go over.” Toretto said finally. His voice was so low and so even that it made Brian feel even more panicky. He didn’t do authority well. Toretto’s voice was the definition of authoritarian.</p>
<p>Brian didn’t let on how nervous that sentence made him. Stuff was code for rules.  He had followed juvie’s rules just fine but that had been by his own choice. This wasn’t. This was so far from <em>his</em> choice it couldn’t even be called <em>a</em> choice.</p>
<p>“I live in a house down in Echo Park. It’s me, my little sister and my best friend Vince.” Toretto outlined. His eyes never left the road but the eerie feeling of him being hyper-aware of everything Brian was doing didn’t go away. “My sister Mia is nineteen. She’s taken control of the small grocery store we own so that’s where she’s spending her time when she’s not in class. If you want to go with her anytime instead of the garage with me, that’s fine.”</p>
<p>What a choice. A garage, probably one of his favorite places in the world, but with a guy he wanted nothing to do with or a boring grocery store with a girl he didn’t want to know but was safer than her brother.</p>
<p>“Vince is a hot head but he won’t go at you unless you go at him first. If he’s annoying you, ignore him.” Toretto continued. “He doesn’t like change but he’s loyal as hell.”</p>
<p>He sounded maybe a little like Rome. And speaking of, Brian had to try to call him when he got a chance. Maybe he’d try to go with the sister and slip out to use a payphone or something.</p>
<p>Toretto kept going, like Brian not saying anything in response to all of this wasn’t a big deal. “You get your own room. Nothing huge but no one can go in it but you. I’m not gonna tell you to keep it clean like you’re ten, if you want to live in a pig sty that’s your problem. Vince has part of the basement and Mia’s got her own room upstairs with mine. Knock and wait for permission if you want in their rooms, don’t go in when they’re not there. We respect everyone’s space. If you need me though, you’re always allowed in my room. You don’t have to get permission. You always have it.”</p>
<p>This was probably the point where he was going to outline his policy on morning blowjobs – <em>frequent and mandatory – </em>or maybe just a pointed hint that he was expected to make use of the permission.</p>
<p>The bigger man just kept talking, though, so Brian figured it was the second.</p>
<p>“I know you got your GED a few months ago. If you want to do something like college, you’re probably going to have to wait until you turn eighteen because you’re supposed to be with one of us all of the time. We’ll figure out a bunch of this as we go. For now the main stuff is about everyone’s bedrooms, that we all share the housework and that you have to go with me to the garage or Mia to the store every day. You can pick.” Toretto paused like he was weighing his words even more carefully. Brian got the sense that his earlier decision about Toretto being a quiet guy was still right, even though he’d just said a hell of a lot. Everything he was choosing to say now seemed thought over, maybe even rehearsed.</p>
<p>Nothing he had said so far seemed awful. If Brian was a trusting fool, he might have been sighing in relief by now.</p>
<p>He wasn’t a trusting fool.</p>
<p>Maybe whatever Toretto said next wouldn’t be shitty either but eventually the nastiness would come to light. Eventually Brian would learn the price he would be paying for his new bedroom, for the food they’d give him and the freedom he was apparently getting. Eventually he would see how his Mark planned on ripping him to pieces.</p>
<p>“I know you didn’t want this. That asshole McConnell told me so and I can see it in your eyes.” Toretto said, “But I’ve been in places like that. Not juvie, real prison. Not long. Enough, though. I’m not going to let you rot in there.”</p>
<p>Rotting wasn’t what he’d been doing. It had been surviving. Making the safer choice for once in his life.</p>
<p>“I get you don’t trust me. I don’t know why but I get you’ve got your own feelings about Marks. I was raised to cherish my Mark, though. That you would be the most important person in the world to me.” He paused and Brian heard what he wanted to say, that Brian <em>already was</em> the most important person in the world to him. It was bullshit, though, toxic and insane. Even if this poor bastard believed it, they’d get twisted around until the hated each other sooner or later.</p>
<p>Brian had been staring straight at the windshield through the whole thing. Now, he turned away so he could look out his window instead. He didn’t even want to see Toretto in his periphery. He wanted to pretend he didn’t exist.</p>
<p>Toretto wasn’t done, though.</p>
<p>His voice went even softer, the gravelly tone smoothing out into something that Brian could imagine whispering to him in bed. “Someday you’re going to trust that I’ll never hurt you. Someday you’ll know that like you know your own name, you have my word.”</p>
<p>Maybe he really believed that.</p>
<p>Brian didn’t.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>---</strong>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Later, he laid in his new bed with soft freshly washed sheets with a hot plate of leftover lasagna sitting on the nightstand next to him and he tried not to think.</p>
<p>Meeting Mia had been easy. She was his age and pretty, not as intense as her brother but no less commanding. She’d taken one look at his sorry ass and started fussing in a way that reminded him of Rome’s grandmother. She wanted to give him ice for his bruises, she wanted to know what medications he was supposed to be taking, she forced a plate of lasagna on him and wanted to watch him eat it. Then sent him up to his room to rest with yet another plate. She said he looked tired.</p>
<p>She was nice.</p>
<p>Genuinely so. It was weird. She wasn’t overbearing and she bantered with a quiet Toretto while she banged around the kitchen. She felt older than him but looked younger.</p>
<p>He liked her, grudgingly.</p>
<p>The other guy in the house, Vince, wasn’t there and Brian was thankful. There was only so much he could deal with in a day.</p>
<p>Toretto hadn’t said much else to him, just shown him his room.</p>
<p>Now was the first time in a long fucking time that he was completely alone. The silence rang in his ears and he wasn’t sure he could take it. His head throbbed and his ribs were no happier with him. He knew he needed a plan to get out of this. He knew he couldn’t trust all those promises Toretto had made.</p>
<p>He was tired though, all the way down this bones even though it was barely afternoon. He was full of food that had tasted goddamn fantastic and he was reasonably sure hadn’t been spit in.</p>
<p><em>Later, </em>he promised himself. He closed his eyes, <em>later I’ll figure out a way out of this. </em></p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>---</strong>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Whatever half-cooked plan he had come up with in-between each bout of coma-like sleep he’d gotten yesterday and through the night was killed when he got told about the ‘check-in’s’ the next morning.</p>
<p>Breakfast was a weird and tense affair that left Brian feeling even more off-kilter than before he’d come in, if that was even possible. Toretto and his sister were there, which he had been prepared for. He had been bracing himself for the return of Vince so when he saw a tall guy with a bunch of tattoos down his bare arms he wasn’t too thrown off. Then though, there was a girl maybe his and Mia’s age named Letty, a guy closer to Toretto and Vince’s age named Leon, and a tweaker kid named Jesse that could have been twelve or twenty-two for all Brian knew.</p>
<p>There were too many of them.</p>
<p>They got in each other’s space, they touched each other like it was no big deal, they grabbed things off plates that weren’t theirs and they interrupted each other constantly. It made his head ache to be around them for five minutes and he was expected to deal with it day in and day out for fucking <em>months?</em></p>
<p>They seemed to purposefully ignore him. Nobody touched him and nobody reached for food from his plate. He curled an arm around it like he did back in juvie, just to let them know he wouldn’t take kindly to it but it turned out not to be an issue. They had mostly nodded to say hello and then left him alone, which was the only plus about them.</p>
<p>It wasn’t until Toretto, who had been mostly quiet until then, had turned to him and said his name that the rest of them finally shut the hell up.</p>
<p>Brian looked back at Toretto steadily, not willing to show how close he was to freaking out.</p>
<p>“Keep an ear out for the phone. They’ll want to talk to you, not me.” Toretto said, like that made any sense whatsoever.</p>
<p>He raised an eyebrow.</p>
<p>“Is this kid mute?” Letty asked loudly, like that was going to goad him into reciting a goddamn monologue.</p>
<p>Toretto ignored her, “The check in.” He said to Brian.</p>
<p>That didn’t clear anything up.</p>
<p>At least Toretto seemed to get that because he kept talking as though Brian had asked a question, “Maybe they didn’t tell you. They’re going to call here every morning. You have to answer the phone and check in with them. Sometimes they’ll ask to talk to me too but mostly they want you.”</p>
<p>And it wasn’t that Brian didn’t think that they’d look for him if Toretto called him in as a runaway, it was just that he thought that if he played his cards right he could maybe get a couple of days head start.</p>
<p>Now, the best he could get was twenty-four hours and that was only if he could shake the Toretto siblings, who seemed like kind of unshakable people.</p>
<p>He tried to remind himself that he barely knew them and that they were probably only going to watch him crazy close in the beginning. If he gave himself a chance to get to know their routines and let them ease off the babysitting, he would be able to figure out a plan.</p>
<p>That was logical.</p>
<p>Brian didn’t really do logical great.</p>
<p>He was better with gut instincts. Right about now, his gut was screaming at him to get as far away from Dominic Toretto as physically possible.</p>
<p>
  <em>Settle down, be cool. It’ll happen. It’s just going to take a little bit more time. It’s okay. </em>
</p>
<p>It wasn’t okay, though. His fist clenched just thinking about it and that nervous fidgety feeling from the day before came back with a vengeance. He was already sick of it but he couldn’t manage to shake it. This wasn’t him. He was always the definition of cool calm and collected. Adrenalin junkie, sure. But not a stupid one. Not scared.</p>
<p>Toretto had him tied up in knots.</p>
<p>He was going to have an ulcer inside of a month if he didn’t figure out how to relax.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>Thank you so much for all the comments, kudos and bookmarks for the first chapter, I really appreciate all the support! </p>
<p>Feedback is love :)</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0003"><h2>3. Chapter Three</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <hr/>
<p>
  <strong>Chapter Three</strong>
</p>
<hr/>
<p> </p>
<p>As much as he missed cars, he chose the grocery store and Mia for the entire first week. Just the thought of going with Toretto, of being stuck in a car with him and Vince and whoever else was riding along that morning was enough to make him want to hurl. He’d actually done some of that lately, hurling that was. Waiting for the other shoe to drop was hell.</p>
<p>One week down and it hadn’t come though. Toretto didn’t demand Brian get on his knees for him, no one threw a fist at him, no one knocked him down. They left him be for the most part. Brian tried to stay as silent as he could but Mia and Jesse made serious efforts to talk to him and sometimes Brian talked back.</p>
<p>Jesse wasn’t so bad, once you got over the twitchy energy he threw off. He talked about cars like they were the body of Christ. Some of the plans for mods that he spun off were exciting and got Brian’s heart pumping in ways he had almost forgotten. Staying away from Jesse’s endless chatter and requests to go see his newest project would have been smarter but Brian couldn’t bring himself to avoid the guy.</p>
<p>He couldn’t imagine what being in the garage with Jesse and an actual car would be like. Probably fucking awesome.</p>
<p>He picked Mia anyway.</p>
<p>She seemed to think it was funny that he always went with her. Vince didn’t seem thrilled by it but Toretto didn’t act like he cared one way or another.</p>
<p>Mostly Mia gave him stupid little tasks and didn’t mind if he got sidetracked by a magazine or something on TV. He wasn’t looking to slack off, his focus was just a little shot.</p>
<p>They talked some, mostly it was Mia talking to him and him grunting back. She didn’t ask why he avoided her brother like he was diseased, which he appreciated just enough to earn her a few sentences in return.</p>
<p>Today, he was restocking the cooler with drinks which was boring but not as bad as dusting the shelves.</p>
<p>“What do you want for lunch, Brian?” Mia called to him, like there was actually a question about it.</p>
<p>The whole team made fun of Mia’s tuna, said it was the Achilles heel of her cooking. Brian thought they were crazy. Mia’s tuna sandwiches were the shit.</p>
<p>“Tuna,” Brian answered, “No crusts please.” He always added the <em>please</em> for her, because he wasn’t an asshole. Don’t get bitchy with the hands that made your sandwiches.</p>
<p>Mia laughed, “Funny, I thought you’d say that.” And he heard a plate get dropped down onto the counter. “You can finish that after.”</p>
<p>He put the last few cans in a line and shut the door to the cooler. In the California heat, shoving his arms in a refrigerator wasn’t a bad way to spend an hour. He was almost bummed that the grocery’s deli section was too small to merit a walk in freezer. He walked over to the counter and dropped into the seat in front of his sandwich. Mia was already sitting on the corner right by him so they could face each other and give each other some space at the same time. She was considerate like that.</p>
<p>“So I don’t want you to freak out,” Mia started, like that was a great way to start a sentence, “But Maria is going to come a couple of hours early for her shift and you and I will leave then.”</p>
<p>Brian narrowed his eyes and didn’t touch his sandwich, even though it was perfectly devoid of crust. “Why?”</p>
<p>“Because you seem to have one pair of jeans and two t-shirts.” Mia answered. She said this matter-of-factly, with no pity in her voice but Brian still bristled at the idea that what he had wasn’t enough.</p>
<p>“And what’s the problem?” He said with a tight voice.</p>
<p>She watched him closely, “Nobody likes doing laundry that much. Also if you end up going to the garage with Dom you’ll get covered in grease like he does.”</p>
<p><em>If</em> he ended up going with Dom. Not <em>when</em>. He appreciated that she’d phrased it that way, enough to drop the tense set of his shoulders just a little. “I don’t need new clothes.”</p>
<p>“We’re not allowed to pay you,” Mia said as if Brian hadn’t said anything at all, “It’s all part of the release rules. Still, they’re hardly going to know if we compensate your work in t-shirts and tuna.”</p>
<p>Mia was doing everything right – no pity, no charity – but it still didn’t sit right with him. “He tell you to?” He asked before he could stop himself.</p>
<p>“He?” Mia asked lightly, playing dumb. Any bit of goodwill he had towards her evaporated.</p>
<p>She knew damn well who he meant.</p>
<p>Brian stayed silent, unwilling to say his name even. It felt stupid, like he was a little kid who was playing some sort of ‘I can’t see you so you can’t see me’ game with the boogie man. Still, even when he berated himself for it, just thinking too much about Toretto made him lose his lunch.</p>
<p>Mia sighed and nudged his plate just a tiny bit closer to him, “He didn’t tell me to do anything, Brian. I have eyes and a wallet of my own.”</p>
<p>His stomach unclenched just a little. Not enough to make him reach for the sandwich but enough that he wasn’t so tied up in knots. Toretto giving him anything more than the bare requirements that the law said he had to was beyond anything he could deal with.</p>
<p>Mia looked like she really wanted to touch him, hug him maybe, but she knew better. “I’m sorry. I didn’t think you’d care about it so much. I should have told you after lunch.”</p>
<p>After lunch because she knew damned well he wasn’t half as interested in his tuna as he had been ten minutes ago.</p>
<p>“I’ll finish up the cooler,” Brian said dully and he stood up to do it.</p>
<p>Mia didn’t say anything but he heard her soft sigh as though they were actual words. He flinched and she went silent for the next two hours.</p>
<p>They still went and got the clothes.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>---</strong>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“What do you want to go with Mia so bad for all the time?” Vince stepped into Brian’s path on his way out the door.</p>
<p>Toretto was still upstairs. What a guy who had no hair and wore greased up wife beaters to work needed with so much prep time was beyond Brian and he didn’t care to find out. He heard Mia messing around in the kitchen with Leon. Letty and Jesse hadn’t come today, which was probably why Vince was able to actually corner him.</p>
<p>Brian didn’t bother answering. Vince was pretty much asking if Brian wanted to get into her pants and he didn’t so there wasn’t anything to talk about.</p>
<p>“If I didn’t hear you on the phone with juvie every morning, I’d swear you never spoke.” Vince kept talking. Too bad Brian’s philosophy towards useless discussion wasn’t contagious. “There’s no point in getting hot for her, even if Marks don’t mean anything to you they mean a fuckton to her.”</p>
<p>One, he’d noticed. Two, Mia was occupying some weird place in his mind that was kind of like ‘mother of the enemy den’ and even though that was a complicated place for her to be there was no sliver of it that involved lust. Not even for a second.</p>
<p>He got the sense that Vince wasn’t going to let it go. Even if Brian got out of this particular conversation, Vince would find a way to bring it back up. So, he said, “I’m not hot for Mia.”</p>
<p>Vince stared hard at him, “You that scared of Dom, then?”</p>
<p>Just the thought of labeling it that way – fear – made him clench his fists down by his sides. Vince caught the motion and took a step back from him, finally giving him some actual space. Apparently he didn’t want to get punched. </p>
<p>“Dom takes care of his own.” Vince said quietly, “That means you too. He’s not going to attack you or… whatever it is you’re afraid he’ll do.”</p>
<p>“I’m not afraid,” Brian said through nearly gritted teeth. He <em>hissed</em> it, practically. It still tasted like ash in his mouth.</p>
<p>Vince didn’t look at him any different. Great, another person in this goddamned house who treated Brian like he was a little boy afraid of his own shadow. <em>Pity</em>, even if they took great pains to avoid letting it read that way.</p>
<p>“Then come to the garage,” Vince said with the slow start of a grin and something different flashing in his eyes. It was the kind of look that used to mean Rome was about to make a wild dare. “The store is boring. Come with us today.”</p>
<p>Before Brian got to say anything to that, the stairs behind him creaked and he froze for a split second before he darted to the side so his back wouldn’t be to the man who had nearly silently crept down them. Toretto watched him with his intense eyes and Brian tried to meet them with his own stare. He managed it but it didn’t feel much like victory.</p>
<p>“Brian gets to pick, Vince,” Toretto tore his eyes away to give Vince a look that promised more discussion later, “Don’t bother him for it.”</p>
<p>Vince backed down, nodding and abruptly going out the door. He didn’t even glance at Brian on his way out. Brian himself took the coward’s way out of it. He turned away from Dom to cut back around to the kitchen and the relative safety of Mia and Leon.</p>
<p>Dom didn’t stop him.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>---</strong>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>He went with Mia. He went with Mia every day for another two weeks.</p>
<p>
  
</p>
<p>
  <strong>---</strong>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>By the end of his first month with his Mark, Brian could still count on one hand the number of one on one conversations that they’d had. Toretto said things to him, generally at breakfast or dinner and Brian even occasionally answered but <em>never</em> were they alone.</p>
<p>Grudgingly, Brian acknowledged the possibility that Toretto was not going to be demanding those morning blow jobs. He could just be playing the long game – hell, he was <em>definitely</em> playing the long game – but for now he was probably safe.</p>
<p>He had no illusions that it would last. He still held firm to his first impression of Toretto and what was probably a violent, explosive temper. One bad fight and Brian would definitely find himself bent over the nearest surface so the lack of contact was a blessing. No conversations, no fights.</p>
<p>As long as he didn’t piss Toretto off in a serious way, things would probably be okay.</p>
<p>Avoidance was key.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>---</strong>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“I didn’t think it was going to be a problem, Dominic.” Mia insisted in a near whisper.</p>
<p>She and her brother were in the kitchen a full hour before someone would knock on Brian’s door to wake him up. Where Mia and Toretto had bedrooms upstairs and Vince had his little corner of the basement, Brian’s bedroom was on the ground floor, right next to the kitchen. It usually meant that he woke up to the sound of Mia starting breakfast before she knocked. This was different.</p>
<p>Toretto’s rumbling voice answered her just as quietly, “Is there any way you can get out of it?”</p>
<p>“I would if I could, you know that.” Mia said with regret in her voice, “They assign the practical times and there’s no switching.”</p>
<p>He knew what practical she meant only because she had been stressing about the test for the entire time he’d known her. She told him she was happy with the time she’d gotten, near the beginning, because she didn’t want to wait any longer than she had to. So why would she talk about changing it now?</p>
<p>“He’s not okay with anyone besides Jesse.” Toretto said.</p>
<p>Their footsteps shifted and Mia’s got closer. She was right outside his door, probably listening so she could make sure he was asleep. He stayed still and tried to keep his breathing as even as possible.</p>
<p>A few seconds later she went back to Toretto. “And Jesse obviously can’t run the store and watch out for Brian. I wouldn’t even let Vince or Letty do it. Leon probably could, if I have to pick, but he’s never done it before.”</p>
<p>“Leon and Brian have had maybe one conversation.”</p>
<p>They had. It had been about Jesse. Leon seemed like a decent guy, he liked him more than he liked Vince.</p>
<p>“So those are our choices? Option one, Brian and Leon run the store and we pray they don’t burn it down or Brian doesn’t run away. Option two, Brian goes with you to the garage and we pray he doesn’t have a panic attack?” Mia asked incredulously. “Those are literally the choices, Dom.”</p>
<p>His sleepy brain caught up with what they were talking about. Mia had to take the day off from the store to go to her exam and they didn’t know what to do with him. He couldn’t remember this sort of conversation coming up even when he’d been a little kid. <em>Leave him</em>, his dad always said. Brian had spent plenty of time on his own, which was fine by him. It always had been. Well, maybe not always.</p>
<p>The point was, he was fine on his own.</p>
<p>Now though, it wasn’t an option. He knew that there was no way the Toretto siblings were leaving him on his own. They didn’t trust him and, to be fair, they shouldn’t.</p>
<p>Toretto’s answer wasn’t really reassuring, “He’ll come with me.” He said firmly. Then, to Brian’s absolute dead-ass surprise, he got a little hesitant sounding, “I’ll… Leon can drive with him. I’ll do paperwork in back. Vince, Letty and Leon can keep an eye on him. He’ll hang with Jesse, probably.”</p>
<p>There was a full thirty seconds of dead silence after he finished issuing his proclamation.</p>
<p>Mia broke it, “Letting him avoid you is never going to get you anywhere, Dom.”</p>
<p>There it was again… <em>letting him</em>. Like Toretto was entitled to forcing the issue. Even Mia – nice, kind Mia – thought that a Soulmark meant that Brian belonged to him.</p>
<p>Toretto let out a sigh so harsh it sounded more like a grunt. Clearly audible through the door. “You’re not the one who gets to see him tense up every time I get close. He’s waiting for me to fuck him over somehow. He’s still afraid.”</p>
<p>“And that’s never going to get better until he gets to know you!” Mia countered. Her voice had that special level of exasperation in it reserved for a woman surrounded by men.</p>
<p>“If I force him into anything, even just talking to me, I’m going to prove him right. Whatever it is he thinks I’m going to do, if I force him then he’s right about me.” Toretto insisted.</p>
<p>Mia let out a huff of breath and softened, “So what, you won’t force him to talk to you because that’s going to freak him out but if he never talks to you then he’s always going to be freaked out? We’re just going in circles.”</p>
<p>“You think I want it this way?” Toretto asked, “This is hell, Mia.”</p>
<p>The rustling of cloth made Brian guess that Mia had hugged him in answer. She didn’t seem to know what else to say but Brian couldn’t blame her – neither did he.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>---</strong>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Mia’s test was three days out. She talked to him about it at the store that morning and Brian didn’t let on that he had heard them talking. He might have suspected they had done it on purpose but nothing pointed to it besides his own paranoia so he had quietly let go of the idea sometime mid-breakfast.</p>
<p>“Jesse is going to be so excited.” Mia said enthusiastically. She clearly wanted to play up every non-Dom based pro for going to the garage. “He’s been talking about showing you around since before you even came.”</p>
<p>Without meaning to, Brian froze just a split second. He had a package of paper napkins in his hand so he could restock the counter and he saw her see him react. Somehow he had never really considered what finding out about <em>him</em> had been like on their end.</p>
<p>Mia watched him carefully, “When they said you’d gotten busted for cars - ”</p>
<p>“Don’t.” Brian cut her off, “Just please don’t.”</p>
<p>“Don’t what?” Mia asked.</p>
<p>He went through the motions of opening the paper wrapper around the napkins and pulling out bunches to put into the dispensers with so much focus his head ached. He didn’t answer her because the answer was obvious. Mia was nice and Mia was safer but she was also constantly looking for ways to connect him and her brother. She wasn’t his friend, not really. He needed to remember that.</p>
<p>She walked around the corner to lean down in front of him. “Brian, if you don’t want to talk about something we don’t have to. I’m sorry if I upset you.”</p>
<p>“I’m not upset.” Brian answered without looking at her. He wasn’t really. He just didn’t need to hear about what they had thought of him at first. He definitely didn’t want to hear about what Toretto had thought when juvie had called back to say that Brian didn’t want to meet him, let alone live with him.</p>
<p>She shook her head, “You are and that’s okay. You’re scared and that’s okay too. Whatever you feel is valid.”</p>
<p>“And if I can’t stand your brother? Is that valid, Mia?” Brian asked snidely. He would have almost felt bad about sniping at her except her hippy <em>feelings are good</em> speech annoyed him in ways he couldn’t quite put into words. He didn’t want to be psychoanalyzed.</p>
<p>Mia was quiet and Brian didn’t bother standing around waiting for an answer. He went to the next dispenser and shoved napkins in like they had personally offended him. They had. Everything in this goddamned building offended him.</p>
<p>“Of course it is,” Mia said finally. Hearing someone from Team Soulmark finally acknowledge that he was allowed to hate Toretto was surprising enough that he finally looked at her.</p>
<p>She didn’t look happy. “Brian, if you’ve gotten to know him. If you guys just can’t agree on anything and Dom makes you feel bad or upset… if you can’t stand him then that’s valid.”</p>
<p>He heard what she was really saying. <em>How can you say you can’t stand him when you won’t talk to him?</em></p>
<p>He wanted out. He <em>needed</em> to get out of the building. He needed to be alone for five fucking minutes. “I want to get out of here.” He said, knowing he couldn’t have it. He shoved himself away from the counter so hard he had to take a few staggering steps backwards just to keep from falling flat on his back.</p>
<p>Mia bit her lip, “You know we can’t leave for hours still.”</p>
<p>He laughed, “I don’t want to go back to your house. I don’t want to go with you. I want to get the fuck away. Anywhere as long as I’m by myself.” He turned away from her and braced his hands against the glass of the door. He wanted to smash it with his bare fists. He clenched his eyes shut and he could just imagine it, the way it would sound, how the glass would splinter into nearly as many pieces as he felt like he was in.</p>
<p>He didn’t move. He dragged in a breath that felt painful. “How about I go sit outside for five minutes? Is that okay, Warden?”</p>
<p>“Brian,” Mia said softly, like she didn’t know what to do with something as messed up as him, “Brian, you’re not a prisoner.”</p>
<p>“I am, Mia. Don’t twist it around to make yourself feel better.” He pressed his forehead to the glass, “Can I go outside or not? I’m not running away.” That he wanted to went unsaid. He was sure she got the picture.</p>
<p>Mia sighed, “Go ahead.” She hesitated and he knew she wanted to say something else. Maybe a request to stay where she could see him but then she’d just be proving herself wrong. He <em>was</em> a prisoner.</p>
<p>He went outside before she could say anything else.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>---</strong>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>He didn’t go back in for an hour.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>---</strong>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>He waited for Mia or Toretto to say something about it later, to get mad at him or to give him some more pity. They didn’t for hours. Mia let him ignore her the rest of the afternoon, silently presenting him with a crustless tuna sandwich at lunch time that he couldn’t stand more than a single bite of. They didn’t say anything during dinner either but he felt them watching him push food around on his plate.</p>
<p>When Brian came out of the bathroom and found Toretto sitting on the ground in the hallway, well away from Brian’s path from the bathroom to his bedroom, he knew time was up.</p>
<p>“Mia said you had a bad day.” Toretto said in a low rumble.</p>
<p>Brian flicked the light off and sent them into near pitch black darkness. It was late, there were only streetlights on outside and the faint glow coming from the staircase towards the front of the house. Just enough that he could see an outline of Toretto but not enough to see his face. Brian hoped it was the same on his end.</p>
<p>He didn’t sit down, this wasn’t a pow-wow he had signed up for. “I’m fine.” He answered because he had to.</p>
<p>“I don’t think you are but we can pretend if you want.” Toretto answered. “Or you could tell me something true and we can try to work it out.”</p>
<p>Were the Toretto siblings taking psych classes in their spare time? Did they buy some book about teen therapy or something? What was the sudden concern about his mental health for?</p>
<p>Shoving truth at Mia this morning hadn’t really done anything but earn him this weird hallway conversation. Talking to the root of most of his problems wasn’t going to make anything better. “Unless working it out includes giving me a car and a head start then there’s nothing to talk about.”</p>
<p>“So that’s it?” Toretto asked steadily like Brian wasn’t rattling him, “If you can’t have that then you’d rather sit here miserable?”</p>
<p>Brian didn’t answer. He didn’t appreciate being made to sound like a stupid kid having a tantrum. He walked out into the dark hall and went into his bedroom without turning the light on. “Good night,” He said and shut the door.</p>
<p>He laid down in the bed and listened for Toretto to move.</p>
<p>He fell asleep before it happened.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>---</strong>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>The next morning there was a car magazine and a Sports Illustrated shoved under his door. He wasn’t sure what the point was but he took them anyway.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>---</strong>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>The drive to the garage with Leon was weird. Brian was back to his fidgety thing that he was sort of beginning to acknowledge was the start of a panic attack and that didn’t make the drive any easier.</p>
<p>Luckily Leon wasn’t going to the Toretto School of Talking About Your Trauma and he didn’t seem to even notice that Brian was halfway on his way to clawing his skin off. He just talked about what cars they were working on in the garage. Hearing about cars was kind of soothing, just enough to take the edge off.</p>
<p>Well, until they pulled in at least.</p>
<p>It wasn’t the garage itself that was the problem. No, that and the cars were great. The closest to zen he was likely to get anytime soon.</p>
<p>Except that they all belonged to Toretto. The whole building, the cars inside, the customers who were dropping them off. If Brian fucked up, he fucked up Toretto’s stuff and his money. Not great for his whole plan not to piss the guy off.</p>
<p>Add in that Toretto was actually going to be there for an entire eight hour workday. It would be the longest they had ever spent together. Sure, Toretto had said to Mia that he was planning on staying away in the office or whatever but he was going to have to come out at some point. Lunch, a piss break, to check a car’s progress or to help one of the others – sooner or later Dominic Toretto was going to come out and Brian was going to be touching his things and it was just not going to go well.</p>
<p>“Do you always stare at cars like they’re going to eat you?” Leon asked with a laugh. Nice of him to pretend the cars were the problem.</p>
<p>“Nah man, just not paying attention.” Brian brushed his own terror off with his own much less convincing laugh. He forced himself to open the door and step out in one fluid movement instead of panicking even more visibly.</p>
<p>He barely got a chance to close the door before he was nearly tackled from the side.</p>
<p>“You’re here!” Jesse shook his shoulder and laughed, “Dude, what took so long? Come see!”</p>
<p>He heard Leon and Letty burst out laughing but he didn’t get to see them because Jesse was already dragging him away towards some car that looked like it had been set on fire or something. The kid was talking a mile a minute, all about the parts they had ordered and the mods he was planning. When he had finished pointing out every millimeter of the car like Brian didn’t have eyes, he dragged him over to a computer to start talking paint colors.</p>
<p>His hands stopped shaking. His fingers stopped picking at every lose thread in his jeans they could find. His breathing evened out.</p>
<p>Maybe he could do this.</p>
<p> </p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>I hope you enjoyed the chapter! </p>
<p>Feedback is love :)</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0004"><h2>4. Chapter Four</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <hr/>
<p>
  <strong>Chapter Four</strong>
</p>
<hr/>
<p> </p>
<p>“Your boy isn’t a half bad mechanic.” Vince said behind the half closed door to Toretto’s office.</p>
<p>Brian froze in the hallway that led to the bathroom but also made him pass the office that he would have preferred avoiding at all costs. He would have tried to make it the rest of the day or at least tried to find some bush to piss in out back but Letty had noticed the situation. He expected her to stay something but she had mostly just made sure to be near any door he tried to escape out of. He could see from the look on her face that she thought he was pathetic in a vaguely cute kind of way so now he was manning up and passing Toretto’s door to go to the bathroom.</p>
<p>Unfortunately, he hadn’t been keeping track of Vince.</p>
<p>Toretto grunted back and Vince laughed at him. “I know you’re dying in here. Seriously though, after Jesse let him go he picked a random car and pretty much just started in on what needed to be done. He knows what he’s doing.”</p>
<p>“Which one?”</p>
<p>“The maxima, he’s probably almost done.”</p>
<p>“Check it over before you call Mrs. Hernandez for pickup.” Toretto said. For once, Brian didn’t bristle at the idea that his work needed to be checked. It would have been dumb for Toretto to blindly trust him with a client’s car.</p>
<p>“Duh,” Vince answered, “You’re probably safe to come out now, so you know. He doesn’t seem like he’s about to puke anymore.”</p>
<p>Brian scowled.</p>
<p>“If I go out there then he will again.” Toretto said with something in his voice that Brian didn’t care to put a name to.</p>
<p>A pause, “Is anyone allowed to like, <em>ask him</em> what his fucking problem with Soulmarks is?” Vince said finally. “Ever?”</p>
<p>“Leave him be Vince,” Toretto said with a voice like law. It made Brian flinch in his hiding spot. “If he wants to talk about it he can, if not no one is giving him shit for how he feels.”</p>
<p>“This isn’t right, Dom.” Vince said earnestly. Brian wasn’t sure he’d ever heard him sound that way before. “You were so fucking happy when you got that call. Now you’re like a ghost and we’re all tiptoeing around this kid.”</p>
<p>A groan from a chair signaled that Toretto was probably leaning back. Brian could sort of picture it, even if he couldn’t see him. A hand dragged down his face, over his head maybe. A fist clenched at his side.</p>
<p>“He likes Jesse, he’s okay with Mia and Leon. He doesn’t look as starved as he used to, he’s healed up from his fight in juvie. He’s here at the garage getting shit done even though Leon said he was freaking out in the car on the way.” Dom counted off, “That’s progress.”</p>
<p>“Shit progress.” Vince said.</p>
<p>“Anything is good. Fuck, V, do you think this isn’t killing me? He’s terrified of me and I don’t know why.” Frustration dripped from his voice.</p>
<p>“Ask him!”</p>
<p>“A few nights ago I tried to ask him what he got upset with Mia about. I literally sat down in the hallway like twenty feet away from him so I wouldn’t scare him and he still couldn’t stand to talk to me.” Dom told Vince.</p>
<p>Brian took a hesitant step backwards. He didn’t want to keep listening to this shit. If he went back out though, he’d just have to try again later when Vince wasn’t there and Toretto was alone. That didn’t sound good either. Instead, he took another step back, purposefully walked into a shelf lined with parts hard enough to make them rattle and then walked quickly past the semi-opened door. They stopped talking when he went by. Did that mean they hadn’t known he was there? He could never really put it past them to stage conversations.</p>
<p>When he finished his business he came back out and Vince was still in there. Now, though, they were talking cars and something about a race.</p>
<p>Brian didn’t stop to listen.</p>
<p>
  
</p>
<p>
  <strong>---</strong>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Did you have fun with Jesse?” Mia asked lightly while she packed up some leftover potatoes.</p>
<p>Brian was washing the pot she’d used to make them. It was hard going not just licking the thing clean. Mia’s cooking was worth it. “Yeah,” He answered. They hadn’t really talked since that day in the store but Brian wasn’t petty enough to be pissy about it forever. He got his point across well enough the first time, probably. Making her hate him wasn’t going to get him anywhere good.</p>
<p>“He’s um,” She giggled, “Very enthusiastic.”</p>
<p>Brian huffed out a laugh, “I noticed.”</p>
<p>“The others were good? Vince didn’t give you a hard time, right?” Mia asked slightly more hesitantly.</p>
<p>Brian shook his head, “They were fine.” Because they were. It was easier to be around them when the space was bigger and they all had other things to focus on, including him.</p>
<p>Footsteps in the hall caught his attention and he turned, hoping to see Vince. Instead, he got Toretto staring straight at him.</p>
<p>“You can finish that later, we’re going out.” He said in a low rumble.</p>
<p>Brian stared at him. Going out? Where? And even more importantly, why? He’d done his time today, he wanted to get five minutes to himself to breathe before he freaked out again. He <em>needed</em> some freedom, not more time spent under their microscope.</p>
<p>He couldn’t say that to him, though. No fucking way.</p>
<p>Mia didn’t have that problem, “I’ll finish the dishes, Brian. You guys have fun.”</p>
<p>Fun? Fuck her.</p>
<p>He took his sweet time finishing the pot he had already started. <em>Don’t make him wait – that’ll make it worse.</em> The thought came up in his father’s voice. Fists that had to wait were fists that hit harder. Still, he rinsed the pot slowly, dried his already shaky hands so thoroughly he practically took skin off.</p>
<p>Toretto didn’t say a word, he didn’t even stay in the room. He went out the door to the driveway and Brian followed him out like a dead man walking.</p>
<p>“Get in,” Toretto said.</p>
<p>Brian slid into the passenger seat and stared straight ahead as Toretto started to drive.</p>
<p>Silence.</p>
<p>When he stopped the car, they were nowhere. Just some street, warehouses, nothing worthwhile. The sun had long since gone down. What the fuck were they there for?</p>
<p>“When I feel like everything’s closing in on me,” Toretto said and turned to stare directly at him, “I like to drive as fast as I can, sometimes, just to breathe. Sometimes I want to live my life a quarter of a mile at a time. Nothing else matters. Not the mortgage, not the store or the garage, not my team and all their bullshit. For those ten seconds, I’m free.”</p>
<p>Brian pulled in a shaky breath. He could relate. Fuck, could he relate.</p>
<p>“I can’t give you a car and a head start for a lot of reasons. I can’t let the neighbors see you drive because if they report it or get asked you’re back in juvie and I’m not gonna let that happen.” Toretto said, “But I can give you ten seconds to breath, if you can stand having me sitting next to you while you get there.”</p>
<p>It was a good offer. “What’s it going to cost me?”</p>
<p>“I told you,” Toretto said, “I stay in the car. We stop when I say stop. Keep off the main roads.”</p>
<p>Brian shook his head, “No, those are the rules. What’s the price?”</p>
<p>“Look at me,” Toretto asked. He didn’t duck his head down to catch Brian’s eyes or use his hand to make Brian look at him, he just waited.</p>
<p>Somehow, Brian got the sense they could sit there for an hour before Toretto asked him again. The choice felt important. So he looked up.</p>
<p>Toretto held his gaze steadily, “There is no ledger between us. You don’t owe me a thing.”</p>
<p>There was a cost to everything and Brian had learned that the hard way years ago. Tonight, though, he couldn’t resist what Toretto was offering. He wanted freedom, even if he paid something down the line. Even if this was just some twisted game.</p>
<p>“Okay.” He said finally.</p>
<p>Without another word, Toretto opened his door and gestured for Brian to do the same. He didn’t need to ask again. They switched seats without a word.</p>
<p>When Brian settled he gripped the steering wheel and just sat there for what felt like an entire lifetime. Being back behind a wheel felt good, maybe better than he had felt since a cop dragged him away from it the last time.</p>
<p>“We driving?” Toretto asked.</p>
<p>Brian flashed a grin at the open road ahead of him, “Hell yes.”</p>
<p>He hit the gas.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>---</strong>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Brian didn’t dare ask to go driving again. Toretto didn’t offer but he also didn’t demand anything from Brian to pay for the privilege either.</p>
<p>His Dad had done that a few times, lull him into a false sense of security and then reveal the trick after. It used to hurt worse than just not getting whatever he was offering. Having trust crushed was worse than not having any at all.</p>
<p>So if Toretto was waiting to make his move when Brian asked to drive again, he was going to be waiting a long time.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>---</strong>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>When Brian was young and stupid, before he realized what toxic little strip of skin kept his parents locked in hell, he used to trace his fingers over the swirls of his Soulmark. He’d been a kid in love with cars from pretty much the word <em>go</em>, and little Brian used to think his Mark looked kind of like a car.</p>
<p>Not an actual car, although some people had that for their Marks. A Mark could be anything, really. Words or an image. The image could be anything too, photorealistic, abstract, a symbol that was known or unknown.</p>
<p>Brian’s ran towards abstract.</p>
<p>Picture a wet foggy night, then picture a car driving fast, cutting through all that fog. The displaced swirls of fog in the car’s wake was what his Mark looked like. That’s what he came up with as a kid and that was where his mind had never really stopped going. Even when he stopped looking at the Mark altogether.</p>
<p>By the time he realized that the Mark was a curse and not a gift, he was in school and stuck listening to all the propaganda they pumped kids full of. For a while he’d started putting bandaids over it which was dumb because his mark wasn’t small enough to be covered by just a few and that meant he was going through them way more than was wise considering how much more he needed them other places. He didn’t want to look at it. He didn’t want to think about whoever had the matching Mark.</p>
<p>By the time he was fourteen, somehow even angrier than he had been when he started covering it, he decided that the Mark didn’t mean shit and he shouldn’t give it any power at all. Covering it was a baby’s way of solving the problem. Brian wasn’t a baby anymore.</p>
<p>So he uncovered it. He let the whole world see it.</p>
<p>Except himself. Oh he saw it, sure. Be hard not to considering it was on his arm. He was jealous of the bastards who got theirs on their backs or somewhere hidden. Hell, he’d take his stamped on his ass cheek if that meant he never had to look directly at it.</p>
<p>He just didn’t pay it any attention. It was a smudge of dirt. It was nothing, it wasn’t anything worth looking at hard. He didn’t trace his finger over the curves of it and he sure as shit didn’t think about who it matched.</p>
<p>That sort of spread over onto Toretto. The guy was practically living in wifebeaters and he wasn’t shy. Brian kept waiting for him to ask to really see Brian’s or even touch it. That was kind of a big thing in the whole <em>Mark’s a great</em> community – meaning: the whole fucking world – and it seemed like the intense sort of thing Toretto would get off on.</p>
<p>He didn’t, though.</p>
<p>Sure, Brian caught his eyes wandering but he never said anything and neither did Brian. That was okay, that was how he wanted it to be.</p>
<p>That was how it needed to stay.</p>
<p>He repeated that in his head over and over again.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>---</strong>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>The breakfast check-ins with the social worker or prison guard or whoever called him were pretty simple. It usually lasted about a minute. They asked him to confirm his identity – and he’d managed to speed the process along by answering the phone with “This is Brian O’Conner” – and his current location, as if he wasn’t answering a landline. Then they usually asked him something stupid about his well-being while never coming out and straight up asking if Toretto had fucked him or beaten him or something. Occasionally they tried to test his truthfulness by asking something unexpected that was supposed to like, reveal whether he was being starved or not. He got asked what he’d eaten for breakfast or who had cooked dinner last night. Random, stupid shit. Once every couple of weeks they asked to talk to Toretto and probably played the same games with him.</p>
<p>They were boring calls.</p>
<p>Nobody even stopped talking anymore, not like in the beginning when they all tried to eavesdrop. No one even bothered answering the phone anymore either, they just let Brian get up and grab it himself.</p>
<p>The phone rang like clockwork in the middle of his eggs. He shoved a forkful into his mouth and started chewing quick. When he stood up he left his plate behind, which was kind of a recent development. The first month he took it with him. Now, he was pretty sure that no one was going to try to eat his food and, even if they did, Mia cooked for an army. There was more where his first plate had come from.</p>
<p>“This is Brian O’Conner,” He answered like usual.</p>
<p>The voice on the other end – a woman this time – sounded incredibly bored. He could relate. “And am I calling the Toretto residence?”</p>
<p>No, she dialed Toretto’s number and got the fucking White House. “Yes.”</p>
<p>“Do you have any concerns you need to report?” She asked.</p>
<p>Brian had plenty of concerns, starting with Toretto, moving through rising gas prices and then swinging back around to Toretto. What he didn’t have was proof of problems (except for the gas prices, because <em>seriously</em>) so the answer was obvious, “No.”</p>
<p>“Do you have plans for this weekend?”</p>
<p>They had used that one a couple of times before. He wasn’t sure what answer they were looking for. Did they want to hear that Toretto was taking him to a zoo for like, enrichment or something? Were they checking to see if his answer was going to be something about being involuntarily tied up in the sex dungeon? Either way, the answer he gave, “Just hanging out,” was an easy way of saying that he was planning on sitting on his bed reading magazines and avoiding having to leave the room.</p>
<p>Maybe some video games with Jesse. <em>Maybe</em>.</p>
<p>“We have a request from your father for a visit. We can schedule for this weekend.”</p>
<p>Brian felt the floor drop out from underneath him. “What?”</p>
<p>She repeated herself word for poisonous word. “We have a request from your father for a visit. We can schedule for this weekend.”</p>
<p>Brian shut his gaping mouth and sucked in as much air as he could. His lungs felt tight and his fingertips tingled with the jolt of shock that raced down the whole length of his body. <em>What the fuck?</em> Why would his father want to see him? The bastard hadn’t even wanted to see him when he lived with him, had told him so a hundred times since he was barely old enough to understand what those words meant. Why now? What game was he playing?</p>
<p>“Mr. O’Conner, are you there?”</p>
<p>No, no he wasn’t fucking there. He was gone, he was on fucking Mars. Wherever he had to go to get out of seeing his old man. “Tell him no.”</p>
<p>“Parental rights have not been terminated, Mr. O’Conner,” She countered, still bored. How fucking dare she be bored when his heart was beating out of his chest?</p>
<p>“We got a problem?”</p>
<p>Brian spun around so fast he stumbled and then almost fell when he jerked away from the hand that Toretto tried to steady him with. He hadn’t noticed but the team had stopped talking. They were all staring at him freaking out with expressions that he couldn’t make sense of. The only one who had moved was Toretto. The bigger man stared at Brian with narrowed eyes. Maybe he was concerned, maybe he sensed that he was about to hit the jackpot in manipulating Brian.</p>
<p>The woman on the line kept talking, “Because your custody is currently being held by Dominic Toretto, only he could refuse to allow visitation. I would need to speak with him.”</p>
<p><em>Time to choose,</em> Brian thought a little hysterically, <em>who do you want the least? How badly do you not want to see him? Suck Toretto’s dick bad? Give him the weapons to hurt you bad?</em></p>
<p>Brian heard his fingers creak around the plastic of the phone. The bones literally clicked he was holding it so tight. Slowly, he extended the phone out to Toretto, “Tell her no.”</p>
<p>Toretto didn’t say anything, he just searched Brian’s eyes like he was going to get a transcript of the conversation from them.</p>
<p>Mia stepped a little closer to them but she didn’t get close. Brian didn’t even look at her. She couldn’t help. “Brian, tell them no about what?”</p>
<p>Brian opened his mouth and instead of speaking just pulled in a weird breath that made him sound like a winded, asthmatic dog. “Tell her no.” He said again. <em>Don’t want to tell you why. Don’t want you to know how to hurt me. </em></p>
<p>“Yeah,” Letty echoed, “<em>No, I don’t have to stay here anymore? </em>Face it kid, Dom’s got no reason to trust you’re not playing him.”</p>
<p><em>Fuck, fuck, fuck</em>…</p>
<p>“Brian, what’s going on?” Mia took another step forward, “Whatever it is, just breathe okay? You’re shaking.”</p>
<p>He was, he could feel it, which was weird because he also felt kind of numb. Toretto and his father at the same time was too much. Just the thought…</p>
<p>Toretto took the phone out of his hand and brought it up to speak, “We’re not interested, the answer is no. You got anything else we need to talk about or are we done for today?” He waited, then pressed the button to end the call. Conversation over.</p>
<p>Brian didn’t feel any better.</p>
<p>His body knew what was coming even before his head did. He was already moving towards the bathroom by the time he realized he was gonna hurl. No time to close the door, no time to say anything. He just dropped to his knees and puked breakfast back up. Eggs in reverse were disgusting.</p>
<p>Toretto had stopped his father from seeing him for now but Brian knew it wouldn’t be the end of it. No, if Dad really wanted to see him, to play some game or get something out of him, he would find a way. He’d push, he would get someone to give him Brian’s address, he would track down Toretto and talk to him himself. He was fucked. There was no way around it. He gagged again and felt tears well up as another wave hit him.</p>
<p>There were voices back out in the kitchen. What if one of them called the prison back? The panic of it, of knowing that seeing his Dad again was like an inevitable car crash that he wasn’t getting out of. He gasped and almost cracked his head on the toilet seat.</p>
<p>“Just breathe,”</p>
<p>Brian flinched back and shifted his weight from his knees to his hip, letting one shaky arm brace the fall onto his side. His legs scrambled back until he was pressed against the tub and facing Toretto.</p>
<p>Toretto sat cross-legged in the doorway of the bathroom, just to the side enough that there was a semi-clear path for Brian to get out if he needed to. Not if Toretto wanted to stop him though, but then if Toretto wanted to touch him he didn’t need to trap him into a bathroom. He could do whatever he wanted, whenever he wanted.</p>
<p>“Breathe,” Toretto repeated again. “Everyone left for the garage but Mia. She’s in the kitchen. We’re not alone.”</p>
<p>That was probably supposed to make him feel better but it didn’t. Nothing really did.</p>
<p>“We can stay home today, if you want.” Toretto offered, “Mia has to go to the store but if you want you and I can stay here. We don’t have to, if you don’t want.”</p>
<p>Brian wasn’t sure what to say to that, which choice he wanted.  Both sucked. What he really wanted was to be shoulder deep under the hood of a car but he didn’t want to talk to anyone while he was. He didn’t want to have to say a goddamned word.</p>
<p>Toretto watched him carefully, “We could go somewhere, if you want. Do something.”</p>
<p>Brian turned his face away, he didn’t want Toretto to read the answers off it. He stared at the wall, silent.</p>
<p>“Listen, Brian,” Toretto said with that same low rumble he used in the car when the left juvie together. “You know they call and talk to me themselves. I didn’t make you tell me what I was saying no to because I want you to see that what you need and what you want is important to me. You didn’t want whatever they were asking about so that’s it, it’s a no. Unless something is about your health or safety then what you want is what I want.”</p>
<p>What he was getting at was obvious. <em>Tell me what you’re so afraid of, you coward. Tell me everything.</em></p>
<p>“If they ask again and you’re not around, I won’t know to say no.” Toretto summed up. “If it’s something you really don’t want, telling me is important.”</p>
<p>Brian could imagine telling Toretto the truth and then coming back here from the store one day to find Toretto and his father waiting for him. But then he had heard enough stories about his and Mia’s childhood to know that Toretto had loved his father. It was just as easy to imagine coming back from the story to find Toretto and his father together because Toretto thought he was doing something good for Brian. He bit his lip, nauseous again.</p>
<p>“I haven’t done anything, have I?” Toretto asked. His voice was even but there was frustration in the question. Brian could practically taste it. “Tell me if I do something that you don’t like.”</p>
<p>“This,” Brian answered, “I don’t like this.”</p>
<p>“I don’t like this either.” Toretto admitted. He leaned to the side a little, like he wanted to make Brian look at him. “My soulmate is shaking and puking and too afraid of me to tell me why. This is hell.”</p>
<p>It was hell for Brian too.</p>
<p>“You’ve been alone with me, you’ve seen me with my friends, my family,” Toretto kept talking insistently. “What do you think I’m going to do to you now that I haven’t before?”</p>
<p>“Maybe nothing,” Brian admitted, “Maybe I could even like you,” Not <em>love</em> – that was too big a word. “But we’d wreck each other eventually. We would hurt each other. I’m not going to give you the chance. I’m not going to give myself the chance.” The last part felt like glass on his tongue. He didn’t like to think about it, that Toretto might not end up the monster… that someday the monster might be Brian.</p>
<p>It was certainly in his blood.</p>
<p>Saying all that out loud felt strange.</p>
<p>But there it was, the absolute truth laid out for Toretto. Brian wouldn’t give him a chance because once that door was open they were going to be bound to destroy each other. Soulmarks weren’t blessings, they were the person you were chained to until you managed to gnaw your own hand off or they killed you – whichever happened first. And yeah, maybe it worked out for some people. Some people were just drinking the kool-aid and some people were pretending because they had to or they felt ashamed, but there were obviously people out there who it worked out for. He wasn’t stupid. That shit was rare, though, lucky in ways that Brian was never going to be.</p>
<p>Silence, a whole goddamned minute of it.</p>
<p>“Who told you that was how it would go?” Toretto asked finally.</p>
<p>“I have eyes. I have ears. No one had to tell me anything.” Brian almost snarled. He turned his head back to face Toretto and was brought short by the genuine emotion on the other man’s face. He looked so confused by him. Like they were different species with only a vaguely shared language.</p>
<p>“I wish,” Toretto swallowed hard, “I wish my parents were still alive. I wish you could have seen them together.”</p>
<p>Brian had already figured that Toretto’s parents were some of the lucky ones. Why else would their son be such a believer?</p>
<p>“Maybe they were really in love,” Brian said softly, “I believe you, if that’s what you say. They were lucky then. Fate or God or whoever decides this shit has to get it right at least every once and a while.”</p>
<p>Toretto’s eyes were locked on his, “And you’re not lucky?” He asked.</p>
<p>He had made it so clear, ever since he found out about Toretto, that he wanted nothing to do with him. Having the guy straight up ask though, having him sitting right there and having to say to his face that Brian truly wanted nothing to do with him – that was hard. For the first time since he’d met him, Brian felt like scum. This guy had probably dreamed of him as a kid and all he got in return for all those hopes was a fucked up kid straight outta juvie.</p>
<p>“<em>You</em> aren’t,” Brian whispered.</p>
<p>“The hell I’m not.” Dom said with more force in his voice than Brian had heard yet. “You love cars, not just driving them but taking them apart and putting them back together too. You feel what I feel when I get to drive fast. You’re quiet but I’ve heard you with Jesse, you’re a smartass when you manage to relax. Full of fire when you want to be. You’re gorgeous and smart and <em>fuck</em>, Brian, how could you not think that you’re perfect for me? How could you not understand that you’re everything I prayed for?”</p>
<p>Brian stared at him, lips parted and eyes wide. His head tried to tell him that those were just pretty words designed to lull him into a false sense of security. His eyes though, they could see Toretto’s. The way the guy was looking at him…</p>
<p>“If my father asks to see me again,” He said slowly, “Say no. Always say no.”</p>
<p>There was no hesitation, no pause to digest or think. Dom nodded hard, “He comes near you I’ll make him regret it.”</p>
<p>Brian wanted to be angry that Toretto thought he needed protection like that. That Brian couldn’t defend himself. Legally, maybe, but in the real world? Brian could dodge a punch great and throw one just as well. He didn’t need Dominic Toretto to guard him like some mean dog ready to bite.</p>
<p>Instead, though, he saw Toretto’s muscles. The angry set of his shoulders. He saw a flash of that temper that he had been trying so hard to avoid.</p>
<p>He imagined his father’s blood on Dom’s fists and slowly something loosened inside of him. “Okay.”</p>
<p>There was a beat of silence that was tense with everything laid bare between them. It made Brian nervous and didn’t ease up the nausea.</p>
<p>Toretto was watching him so carefully and finally there was some understanding dawning on his face. Brian knew he’d been made.</p>
<p>“Your parents,” The bigger man said softly, “Were they Marks?”</p>
<p>Brian stared back at him with as little emotion on his face as he could manage. If Toretto thought this was where Brian tearfully revealed his tragic backstory he had another thing coming. It was maybe the last thing he wanted to do, or second to last after seeing his old man again.</p>
<p>At this point he mostly wanted to go back to sleep.</p>
<p>Toretto didn’t let the silence drag. The second it got obvious that Brian wasn’t going to answer, he laid off. “What’s it going to be? Store, here, garage, somewhere else?”</p>
<p>The switch in conversation threw Brian a little. He probably stared too long at Toretto but the other man just stared evenly back.</p>
<p>
  <em>Fuck it.</em>
</p>
<p>“All I want is to go back to sleep.” Brian said as flippantly as he could. No way was he letting it sound like asking or begging.</p>
<p>Toretto nodded and slowly stood up, “I’ll go tell Mia to head to the store alone today.”</p>
<p><em>Last chance,</em> Brian realized. Toretto was giving him one last reminder of what he was choosing. Alone in the house with him or at the store with Mia and anyone else who wanted to wander in. The thought of different people, of having their voices grate against his too sensitive skin, felt like more than he was up for. All he wanted was to check out of his own head and he was pretty sure that Toretto’s alcohol policy was pretty non-existent. That meant sleep.</p>
<p>When Brian didn’t change his mind, Toretto turned away from him without another word. Soon, he could hear the low rumble of his voice giving Mia the update. How long would it take before he spilled to the others what he’d figured out about Brian?</p>
<p>
  <em>Worry about it later. </em>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>---</strong>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Brian slept for literally five hours.</p>
<p>The only thing that got him moving was his stomach. Puking his breakfast up and then sleeping through lunch was not okay according to pretty much every body part he had. He was so thirsty he was willing to do just about anything for a cold glass of water. After that, he wanted to eat his body weight in something greasy.</p>
<p>He got up and threw on different clothes than he had tried to start the day with all those hours ago. It felt silly and superstitious but fuck that outfit for at least a week.</p>
<p>When he ventured out of his bedroom, the house was quiet in a way that it almost never was. There were always so many people around that it didn’t really get a chance to. He went to the kitchen and got a cup of water straight from the sink that he downed in one go. Then another. His stomach felt like it was sloshing but his mouth thanked him for it.</p>
<p>There were sounds coming out from the garage and Brian knew that had to be Toretto, messing around with the car only he was allowed to touch. Nobody had said that to him, of course, but no one else went near it. Not even Mia. Brian could take a hint.</p>
<p>Toretto wasn’t far but he also wasn’t technically in the house. Brian had never been alone in it, not even two months into this shit show. Hell, he hadn’t even gone upstairs. He only went into the basement to do laundry and then only when he was sure that Vince wasn’t home.</p>
<p>Curiosity was a bitch.</p>
<p>Brian set his glass down and walked over to the staircase. He couldn’t really hear Toretto from there but he also didn’t hear the guy coming back in. He could be quick, quiet. He wasn’t even sure what he wanted to see up there. It was, as far as he knew, only Toretto and Mia’s rooms. A bathroom probably. There had to be more than that, because the house was pretty decently sized but hell if Brian knew.</p>
<p>He walked up the stairs quietly, testing each step as he went so he got a feel for which ones creaked. When he got to the top, he went immediately back down again to make sure he had a good idea of how to get down silently.</p>
<p>That was another good lesson his old man had taught him – how to move silently so the hunter didn’t hear you.</p>
<p>Once he was at the top of the stairs again for real, he went to the first door he saw, right across. It was a bathroom, filled with what looked like mostly Mia’s stuff. The door next to it was shut but unlocked, so Brian cracked it open and found her bedroom. The flash of pink blankets was more than enough, he shut the door and backed away.</p>
<p>After that he found a guest bedroom that looked like it was mostly storage and he thanked whoever was listening that no one had decided to put him there. It was bigger than his glorified closet downstairs but it was also closer to the Torettos and he wanted no part of that.</p>
<p>Then came stairs to an attic and a linen closet.</p>
<p>Only one door left. Brian went still and listened hard again but he didn’t hear anything different downstairs. Just that ringing silence that he hated.</p>
<p>One turn of the knob and the door swung open. He wasn’t sure what he had been expecting. Maybe some sort of dartboard with his picture hanging on it, except that was stupid and not even what he believed anymore.</p>
<p>Instead, he saw a room painted some color between blue and gray. The adult choice of a kid who had probably had a straight up blue room growing up. There were a few posters of cars predictably, but even he had to admit the cars in them were pretty badass looking.</p>
<p>No carpet, wooden furniture that looked like it had gotten handed down for generations and a big black metal dresser thing. Pictures on the wall. An open closet with clothes in it and a bathroom door that was open just enough to see a shower stall through.</p>
<p>It was nice. It was boring. Regular in a way that made Toretto seem more human and less like some shapeless terror.</p>
<p>His eyes kept going to the pictures on the wall but they were too far away to really see well.</p>
<p>
  <em>If Toretto came back in, I could say that I was looking for him. He said I could go in there whenever I wanted. He doesn’t have to know that I already figured out he was in the garage.</em>
</p>
<p>Brian was walked before he had even really decided. He was so fucking stupid sometimes, it was amazing.</p>
<p>The first picture he saw was of Toretto with hair, which would have been interesting except he was also about six in it. There was a kid next to him that looked eerily like Vince, except the kid didn’t look like an asshole so Brian couldn’t really be sure.</p>
<p>Beside it was a picture of Toretto and Mia as a baby. Then Toretto sitting on some guy’s shoulders. His Dad probably, they had the same nose. Toretto was beaming down at the guy like he was the coolest hero the world had ever seen. Brian couldn’t relate.</p>
<p>His eyes went over the pictures and found that they were all pretty much of the people he had met and the two that he would never. The last picture was one of the four Torettos sitting on the porch out front. Dom and Mia were smiling at the camera but their parents only had eyes for each other. They each had a hand on one of their kid’s shoulders but overall, they just looked…</p>
<p>
  <em>Blissfully in love.</em>
</p>
<p>He’d said, downstairs that morning in the bathroom with Dom, that he believed him when he said that his parents had actually been in love. It hadn’t been a lie or at least not intentionally one. Seeing this picture now though, he really got it. No one could fake it that well.</p>
<p>His feet were backing up even though his eyes were still staring. He didn’t want to look at it anymore but he also didn’t want to look away.</p>
<p>He was pushing his luck, though, that Toretto hadn’t already caught him. He turned around and shut the door behind him as silently as he could. Downstairs was still quiet and he went down the stairs with his heart suddenly pounding.</p>
<p>It made no sense, Toretto hadn’t caught him and unless he had cameras in there, he wouldn’t. Brian hadn’t gone though his drawers or touched anything. All he had done was walk forward and look. His eyes couldn’t mess anything up.</p>
<p>Still, the reality of what he had done made him feel even shakier than the whole lack of food thing. He wanted out of the house bad. Away from whatever weird spell had come over him and far from temptation from doing it again.</p>
<p>
  <em>“What’s it going to be? Store, here, garage, somewhere else?”</em>
</p>
<p>Toretto’s offer from before came back to him and Brian knew instantly that even if it meant sitting in a car with the guy, he had <em>go somewhere, do something</em>. Anywhere that wasn’t this house, the store or the garage. Somewhere else sounded like heaven.</p>
<p>He walked loudly past the door to the garage and opened the bathroom door before letting it swing shut behind him audibly. He turned the sink on and kept it on while he went about his business. He didn’t want to go out into the garage but for maybe the first time ever he wanted Toretto to come looking for him.</p>
<p>The guy was, admittedly, usually willing to stay away from Brian so he wasn’t sure if it was going to work but apparently Toretto also thought they were living some bizarre day where all the rules were wonky. Brian heard him coming in and going to the kitchen. The sink started and Brian knew he was probably washing his hands from doing whatever he had done with the car in the garage.</p>
<p>Toretto leaning over the sink with wet hands and his back to Brian was a pretty easy scenario to approach with. He went into the kitchen and still felt jittery but it was a different kind of way.</p>
<p>“You want to go get something to eat?” Toretto called over his shoulder. Not so loud that he would have been heard if Brian was still in the bathroom, so he had apparently noticed Brian coming in.</p>
<p>Going out to eat was also kind of like going for a date and normally Brian would have hated the mere idea of it, but it was also late afternoon and Toretto didn’t seem like he was gearing up to ask Brian to some fancy place. “Yeah,” He answered. Then, because he really was a suicidal little shit he threw in, “Especially if it’s near a beach.”</p>
<p>Toretto laughed and it sounded weird to Brian’s ears. It took him a second to work out why. He’d laughed at things his team said but never once because of something <em>Brian</em> had said. It felt off but it didn’t <em>sound</em> off. Not really.</p>
<p>“Sure,” Toretto said while he dried his hands and turned to face Brian, “It can be near the beach.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>---</strong>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>The sound of the waves kept any awkward silences from being a problem and the mostly empty paper plate of battered shrimp and fries kept Brian from feeling as jittery as before.</p>
<p>Toretto was sitting beside him but the other man didn’t seem anxious to make this some big heartfelt moment of sharing and monologuing about their feelings. They hadn’t said much of anything to each other and it didn’t seem like it was going to change. Slowly, the dread eased up and Brian felt himself relaxing. They just sat there and ate quietly and stared at the water.</p>
<p>It was… <em>nice?</em></p>
<p> </p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>Thank you for all of the support for the story! I would LOVE to hear what you think of this chapter!</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0005"><h2>5. Chapter Five</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Thank you so much for all the support you guys are showing this story! I truly appreciate it :)</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <hr/>
<p>
  <strong>Chapter Five</strong>
</p><hr/>
<p> </p>
<p>Mia and the others didn’t talk about his freak out that night at dinner.</p>
<p>Mia even had the decency not ask a single thing about how they had spent the day. She didn’t even seem like she wanted to. He had been looking for it all night, waiting for her to ask. Tomorrow at the store, definitely.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>---</strong>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Except she didn’t then either.</p>
<p>As each hour went by and he didn’t have to explain, Brian relaxed a little bit more.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>---</strong>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Brian couldn’t really pretend anymore.</p>
<p>The store was boring as shit.</p>
<p>Jesse had been hounding him about going back to the garage for weeks, pretty much since the last time he’d gone when Mia had been tied up taking her test. He chattered about showing Brian the car he had seen that time – the one that looked like someone had blown it up or at least like it had been ridiculously close to some kind of explosion – and that they were so close to finishing it. What they did with them after that, Brian wasn’t really sure.</p>
<p>And yeah, he wanted to go.</p>
<p>It wasn’t like he had any major passion for stocking shelves. He wouldn’t get any tuna sandwiches at the garage but Brian wasn’t picky about what he ate. Food was food and he loved pretty much all of it.</p>
<p>Jesse and Leon had shown up for breakfast about a half an hour ago and all Jesse wanted to talk about was how they were painting the car today and didn’t he want to come help? Jesse was even trying to sweeten the pot by letting Brian pick between the two colors they had narrowed it down between.</p>
<p>“Come on, Bri, orange or green?” Jesse kept poking him with his fork. He was the only person who touched him while he ate, or in general really. “You could pick.”</p>
<p>“Pick green.” Vince said. “Everyone likes green better than orange.”</p>
<p>Brian was tempted to pick orange just to annoy him. Vince was loud and obnoxious but Dom had been right, he was kind of all bark and no bite – at least to Brian. He heard plenty about fights Vince got into pretty much everywhere else.</p>
<p>Letty leaned into his space and whispered just loud enough for Vince to catch some of the words, “Come to the garage, pick orange and I will literally pay you.”</p>
<p>Vince threw some of his toast at Letty, “Can it, Letty.”</p>
<p>Brian tilted his head towards Letty but kept eye contact with Vince, “How much we talking?”</p>
<p>Letty laughed, which was fine, but Vince sputtered, which was great. Mia burst out laughing and Leon wasn’t too far behind.</p>
<p>“I was team orange,” Leon rolled his eyes, “But at this point I’m so tired of hearing about it Jesse could do an orange and green zebra stripe on the thing and I wouldn’t give a damn. We need to finish it.”</p>
<p>“We are not doing an orange and green zebra stripe,” Toretto spoke up finally.</p>
<p>Just the way he said it, the voice of authority again, made Brian want to shake him up. He turned to Toretto with his biggest shit eating grin and almost started arguing for the zebra stripe before what he was about to do caught up with him. He froze, shocked at his own stupidity. Toretto just looked at him and raised an eyebrow, like he was challenging Brian to actually say it. He didn’t look pissed though, he just looked amused.</p>
<p>“Ooh, Brian wants the zebra stripe!” Letty almost cackled. “What’s it gonna be, Dom?”</p>
<p>“I do not.” Brian bit back. He gripped his fork so hard it was liable to bend.</p>
<p>The next piece of crust from Vince’s toast came for Brian’s head, “Oh come on,” Vince groaned, “You were being interesting for like a minute. Don’t crap out on us now.”</p>
<p>Before Brian had even thought it through he said, “Be interesting? How ‘bout this?”</p>
<p>And then he threw his glass of orange juice right in Vince’s face like he was some pissed off woman in a 50’s comedy.</p>
<p>The whole table went silent, Vince and Brian most of all. Brian could feel his eyes go wide as the juice dripped down Vince’s gobsmacked face and damn, Mia bought the pulp-y kind.</p>
<p>Letty recovered first. She whipped her phone out and took a picture of Vince, “That’s what you get for throwing toast at us, asshole!”</p>
<p>Leon and Mia started roaring they were laughing so hard. Jesse’s laugh was quieter but he seemed like he might fall out of his chair. Letty joined in next and Brian waited to see what Vince and Toretto’s reactions would be.</p>
<p>Vince backed up from the table and stood, wiping his hand down his face and flinging juice and pulp down onto the ground. He glared at Brian and turned to Toretto, holding a hand out to point at Brian. “The fuck, Dom?”</p>
<p>“Don’t goad him into playing if you can’t handle it, V.” Toretto just laughed.</p>
<p>“Now the car <em>has </em>to be orange!” Letty beat her hand against Brian’s shoulder.</p>
<p>Vince gripped the back of his chair and leaned forward, “It’s a vote unless he comes with us. That’s what we agreed on. Green won, unless he wants to grow a pair and come with us today.”</p>
<p>Normally Brian didn’t like to let anyone try to reverse-psychology him into anything. Letty called him mute, he stayed silent. Vince tried to say he was too scared to go the garage, he went to the store. It was how he had operated with them from day one. Today though, everything in him wanted that damned car to the ugliest shade of orange he could possibly make it.</p>
<p>Vince smirked at him, “No? Didn’t think so.” Then he turned around and walked out like he was getting the last word.</p>
<p>And fuck that.</p>
<p>“Orange it is, then.” Brian called after him, “You’ve really inspired me, man.”</p>
<p>Vince froze before he flipped Brian off from over his shoulder and walked out of the room.</p>
<p>“We’re going to hear about this for the next seven years, Brian, but damn is it worth it.” Leon laughed.</p>
<p>Brian agreed wholeheartedly.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>---</strong>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>They painted the car neon orange. It was glorious.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>---</strong>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“How much longer you gonna glare at Brian?” Toretto asked Vince after a week. They were in the living room and Brian was walking back from the kitchen just out of sight. Never in his life had he been such an eavesdropper but even he had to admit it was the best way to get a feel for what Toretto was thinking half the time.</p>
<p>There was an angry strum of what Brian assumed was Vince’ electric guitar. He played halfway decently, which was annoying, but luckily he didn’t play it often. Brian would honestly rather listen to it every day if Vince sucked than listen to it once a month if he was amazing. They were somewhere in the middle.</p>
<p>“Another week at least.” Vince said, “Two if he keeps picking the store after all that.”</p>
<p>“How many times do I have to tell you? He can pick the store all he wants, you can’t give him shit for it.” Toretto said with a low voice. It sounded like he said it a lot.</p>
<p>Vince scoffed, “And how many times have I bothered him about it? Like twice, Dom. Hell, I let him throw juice on me and didn’t deck him for it. How much nicer can I possibly be to your boy?”</p>
<p><em>Your boy</em>. Brian’s fists clenched. He’d like to do a whole lot more than throw juice at him now.</p>
<p>“Yeah, yeah, you’re Mother Teresa.” Toretto said back.</p>
<p>“Seriously though, is he going to be a living human being with a personality for one day every two months?” Vince asked grumpily, “Because that’s what we’re getting so far.”</p>
<p>“Chill, Vince.”</p>
<p>“Don’t think I didn’t see your face.” Vince said, “You <em>love it</em> when he wakes the fuck up.”</p>
<p>Brian leaned against the wall and remembered when Dom had said that to him. That he liked Brian better with <em>fire.</em></p>
<p>“Am I supposed to like it better when he’s too freaked out to talk?” Toretto questioned and damn Brian was glad he’d phrased it like that, although he didn’t love being called <em>freaked out</em>.</p>
<p>There was a creak on the stairs and Brian knew it had to be Mia. He stepped back towards the kitchen and started drying the dishes out of earshot of the living room. Better live in wonder than getting caught listening in.</p>
<p>At this point though, he could probably relax a little. Not relax to the point he challenged Toretto, no way, but as long as he didn’t provoke his temper from exploding, he was probably fine for the next nine months.</p>
<p>Probably.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>---</strong>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>It was ten in the morning and Brian was beyond tired of restocking the fridge. Drinks went faster than anything else, really. Other than the deli stuff but Mia handled all of that herself. Not even getting to stick his arms in the cold was worth it at this point. The store was a monotonous hell that Brian was sick of being stuck in.</p>
<p>The bell on the door rang and Brian ignored it. He and Mia had, pretty much silently, agreed that he wasn’t going to handle the customers outside of her bathroom breaks.</p>
<p>There were heavy footsteps behind him and Brian slid the last can in so he could let whoever was coming to grab a drink get in the cooler.</p>
<p>“Hey, asshole, paying customer trying to get a drink here. Get outta my way.”</p>
<p>Brian froze.</p>
<p>His first instinct was to play it cool, no matter how big a dick thing that was to say.</p>
<p>Then the voice caught up with him.</p>
<p>Brian turned around and shut the cooler door and found Rome standing in front of him with a huge grin on his face.</p>
<p>“Can I help you?” Mia called over with annoyance in her voice. She had heard what Rome said and she thought he was serious.</p>
<p>As if Rome was capable of being serious for more than two minutes.</p>
<p>He slapped Rome’s shoulder and started laughing, “Rome!”</p>
<p>Rome was a guy who wasn’t afraid to hug. His whole family was like that. They’d snatched Brian up into hugs over the years that would make his ribs creak. As much as Brian wasn’t that way himself, he wasn’t thrown off when his friend’s arms came around him to practically lift his feet off the floor. Brian just laughed harder.</p>
<p>Then he saw Mia’s utterly shocked expression from over Rome’s shoulder and he almost snorted.</p>
<p>“What are you doing here?” Brian asked, “How did you know where I was?”</p>
<p>Rome let him go and twirled his hands around the store, “You’re not exactly hiding, brother. People see you, people talk. I listen.”</p>
<p>“Who’s your friend, Brian?” Mia walked up to the two of them. She’d wiped the shock off her face and now she just looked friendly. How much of that was legit, Brian couldn’t tell. She was craftier than he’d given her credit for in the beginning.</p>
<p>“Roman Pierce,” Rome introduced himself. He gave Mia what he thought was a flirty smile. “Brian’s best friend. I’ll be your best friend too, if you like?”</p>
<p>“Save it, Rome.” Brian laughed, “Mia’s too smart for you.”</p>
<p>“Mia?” Rome asked, laying it on thick, “That’s a gorgeous name.”</p>
<p>Mia raised an eyebrow, “Yeah, I’m definitely too smart for you.”</p>
<p>Luckily, Rome didn’t seem too put out. Brian hadn’t thought he would be, especially since it was sort of obvious that Mia was in charge of him. He hadn’t been seriously flirting with her, just being friendly to test her out.</p>
<p>Rome laughed again, “Brian get a break anytime soon? How’s that go, work-release style?”</p>
<p>Mia’s smile stayed in place but her eyes darted over to Brian’s and he knew his smile wasn’t fixed on quite as good as hers. “Sure, he can restock the fridge later if you two want to catch up.”</p>
<p>What she was really saying wasn’t that he got a break, not like Rome meant it. He couldn’t <em>leave</em>, he could just stop working for a bit. She didn’t want him and Rome out of the building together.</p>
<p>Rome caught on too, “Thanks, Mia.” He grinned at her all the same but he seemed less genuinely friendly than he had been a minute before. “We’re just going over there.” He pointed out a spare table for the lunch counter. There were only a few, mostly people sat at the actual counter. Rome grabbed Brian’s arm and practically dragged him over.</p>
<p>“They got you on that tight a leash?” Rome whispered once they had sat down.</p>
<p>Brian shrugged, “She doesn’t trust me not to run. Can’t blame her.” Especially not after he had straight up told her and her brother that he wanted to.</p>
<p>“So how’s it work? The work-release thing?” Rome asked, “When you get off your shift, where do you go?”</p>
<p>He didn’t want to talk about this. He wanted to hear how Rome was doing or just listen to his friend tell him some stupid story like usual. This conversation was the last thing that Brian wanted because Rome would instantly understand. He would understand what these stakes were to Brian, what hell this situation was.</p>
<p>“It’s not like that.” He said slowly. Rome’s stare was intense and Brian knew there was no way out of it. He sighed, “Her brother is my Mark. They let me out into his custody.”</p>
<p>Rome’s mouth dropped open and he leaned back in his chair, “Well, shit.”</p>
<p>Brian huffed out a bitter laugh, “Yeah, it’s been a dream come true.”</p>
<p>The stare he was getting made him fidget just a little. Rome’s eyes caught it immediately, like they always did. Sometimes it sucked being around someone who read him so easily. When Rome looked away from him, it was to glance over at Mia. “Well, the sister is pretty. How’s your Mark? Hot?”</p>
<p>“Fuck, Rome.” Brian stretched out a leg and kicked Rome’s chair.</p>
<p>“Keep it cool, asshole, I’m just wondering.” Rome laughed, “I’m not saying marry the dude, just have a little fun with it.”</p>
<p>Brian shot him a dirty look.</p>
<p>That stopped the laughing. Rome leaned back in and he braced his arms on the table to get close, “He okay?”</p>
<p>“He’s fine.” Brian answered, “What have you been up to?”</p>
<p>“You’ve got be joking,” Rome said, “You drop the Mark bomb on me and you think I’d rather talk about <em>school and shit?</em>”</p>
<p>Brian rolled his eyes, “I finished. Maybe I’m feeling nostalgic.”</p>
<p>“That’s a fucking lie and you know it.” Rome scoffed, “School is boring, the neighborhood is the same – boring, my family is the same – boring, I’ve got a girl I’ve been seeing and she’s not boring but only in bed. You caught up?”</p>
<p>Brian stared at him.</p>
<p>Rome sighed, “Look, I get it okay? I was there too, remember? You want me to help you get out of here? I’ll do that. You want me to find some guys to rough him up so he knows you’re off limits? I’ll do that. You have to actually say something, though.”</p>
<p>The anger that had been building died down a little. It wasn’t Rome’s fault. Brian couldn’t even blame him. Everyone was always interested in hearing someone else’ Mark story, it was a big deal. Throw in what Rome knew about Brian’s feelings on the subject and he got it, he really did.</p>
<p>It was just that Toretto was honestly the last thing he wanted to talk about.</p>
<p>“His name is Dominic Toretto. He owns this place and a garage. He’s a little older than me. He thinks Marks are a big deal. He’s kind of intense.” Brian listed off kind of monotone. “Total truth, Rome, I’m tired of talking about him. I’m never away from it, you know?”</p>
<p>Rome looked at him hard, like he was looking for something in Brian’s expression. He sighed, though, and that meant he was backing off. “I’ll ask around, see what I can figure out.” He offered.</p>
<p>Brian shrugged. He didn’t really care either way but it would make Rome feel better so that was okay.</p>
<p>“So, lemme tell you about my girl Sofi man.”</p>
<p>Finally, Brian relaxed. If he knew anything about Roman Pierce – and he did – the story was going to be hilarious and slightly pornographic. Either way, it took him out of his own head and that was what he needed more than anything.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>---</strong>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“So tell me about Roman.”</p>
<p>Brian was halfway to the kitchen door from his room but Toretto’s drawled demand caught him before he could make it to the fridge for some soda. Of fucking course. The hallway in this place was goddamn treacherous.</p>
<p>“Mia works fast.” Brian said without turning around. He kept walking, annoyed that he stopped in the first place.</p>
<p>Toretto walked in behind him and leaned against the counter furthest away from the fridge. Giving space, like always. Gotta keep his stray bitch calm.</p>
<p>“Mia mentioned him when I asked how the store was. Not like she called me at the garage to tell me about it. She’s allowed to tell me about her day.” Toretto defended her evenly. It was maybe the first time he’d done it, so the effort was interesting. Then he ended his little speech with, “So are you.”</p>
<p>“So am I what?” Brian shut the fridge and popped the can of coke. He turned to face Toretto and took a long sip.</p>
<p>Toretto raised an eyebrow, “You’re allowed to tell me about your day too.”</p>
<p>“Gee thanks.” Brian couldn’t help but snipe back at him. “I’ve been holding myself back this whole time, waiting for your blessing.”</p>
<p>“Just throwing it out there.” Toretto waved it aside like Brian wasn’t ruffling any feathers. “So, Roman?”</p>
<p>“Is this you trying to ask if we’re fuck buddies?” Brian got straight to the point. The sooner Toretto got his answer, the sooner Brian could go back to his room.</p>
<p>Toretto just raised an eyebrow, “It’s okay if you were. Not like I’m innocent of playing around before you.”</p>
<p>And <em>fuck</em> wasn’t that a loaded place to take the conversation. Why was Toretto <em>never</em> frustrated with him? Pissed off, thrown off, angry?</p>
<p>“He’s just my friend.” Brian turned the conversation away from the minefield of sex and fidelity. “We grew up living down the street from each other. Happy?”</p>
<p>“That you’ve got a friend who cared enough to track you down?” Toretto said strangely sincerely, “Yeah.”</p>
<p>Brian rolled his eyes, “Rome’s a bad penny, he’ll always turn up. I’m pretty sure you’d be annoyed by him in about ten minutes or less.”</p>
<p>“Like how my best friend bugs you?” Toretto grinned at him, “If you can put up with Vince without problems then I can deal with Rome.”</p>
<p>“You’re gonna throw juice at him?”</p>
<p>Toretto outright laughed and Brian was thrown by it again. First he laughed because Brian demanded a beach, then because he chucked a glass of juice at Vince’s head and now at the suggestion that <em>he</em> throw one at Brian’s friend? Nothing for two months and now this right in a row. He wasn’t looking to make Toretto laugh.</p>
<p>But somehow that was what he kept doing.</p>
<p>“Wouldn’t want to steal your move.” Toretto said finally. “I had to pay Letty in pizza to get her to give up the picture she took but it was worth it. I might get it framed.”</p>
<p>Brian felt the smile stretch over his face before he could stop it. Just the thought of Toretto hanging up a framed picture of Vince dripping in orange juice was more than his self control could take. He saw Toretto’s eyes flash when he saw Brian smile.</p>
<p>“If you want Rome to come over, that’s fine with me. Just warn Mia or I first.” Toretto offered.</p>
<p>The thought of asking Toretto if Rome could come for a playdate was a little demeaning but he vaguely appreciated it. He probably wouldn’t but it was something to hold in his back pocket if he ever thought something might go down that he would need back-up for.</p>
<p>Brian settled for shrugging and giving Dom a warning in return, “Like I said, Rome’s like a bad penny. He’ll figure out who you are and where you live and he’ll turn up here to see you for himself soon enough. Sorry in advance.”</p>
<p>He turned to walk away and only caught the sight of Toretto still smiling at him as he left the room.</p>
<p> </p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>Next Up: <br/>“I’m fine.” He said quietly. </p>
<p>“Don’t seem it.” Dom countered. </p>
<p>He shrugged, “How would you like me to be?” </p>
<p>“Truthful.”</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0006"><h2>6. Chapter Six</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <hr/><p>
  <strong>Chapter Six</strong>
</p><hr/><p> </p><p>
  <em>“Fucking slut!”</em>
</p><p>
  <em>A crash and a scream. </em>
</p><p>
  <em>Brian shivered and hid like a coward. He wasn’t a baby anymore. He was five, he should get up, he should go out there.</em>
</p><p>
  <em>“I should throw you out, you and your fucking brat. You can’t do anything right, you know that? You’re worthless.” </em>
</p><p>
  <em>Please stop, please stop. </em>
</p><p>
  <em>“What would you do without me, bitch?” </em>
</p><p>
  <em>Be happy. Be right. Never take those pills again. Never cry again. </em>
</p><p>
  <em>Another thud of a fist on flesh. Another cry. Another another another. </em>
</p><p>“Brian!”</p><p>
  <em>Stop. Please stop. </em>
</p><p>“Brian, wake up.”</p><p>
  <em>He’s gonna kill her. He’s gonna make her bleed and bleed and bleed and die and… </em>
</p><p>“Brian, wake up. Breathe, okay? Everything is okay.”</p><p>
  <em>Go, help her! Get up, coward. You make everything harder, do something brave for once! Brian pushed the closet door open and peeked out. The mirror was broken. There was blood. There was <strong>always</strong> blood. </em>
</p><p>
  <em>Stop!</em>
</p><p>“Brian, you’re just dreaming. Wake up, baby.”</p><p>
  <em>“Worthless bitch!</em>
</p><p>
  <em>Shut up. Shut up. Leave her alone!</em>
</p><p>“Brian!”</p><p>Brian’s eyes snapped open and he lurched up in his bed. His eyes traced the wall in front of him and couldn’t make sense of it. Where the fuck was he? Where were <em>they?</em> He had to find her, find her before she got hurt worse.</p><p>His feet were still half tangled in the sheets but he stood anyway and fell on the floor in a confused heap. He panted, “Have to, have to…”</p><p>“It’s okay, Brian.” A low voice said to his left.</p><p>Brian realized the door was open and light was spilling in. He squinted his eyes at the man kneeling on the ground in the doorway. “What?”</p><p>“You were having a nightmare. It’s over now, you’re safe.”</p><p>He jerkily twisted around on the ground and traced his stinging eyes over the room he was in. This wasn’t his bedroom.</p><p>Except it was.</p><p>Brian shoved himself up on his knees and crawled to the window. It was open just a crack and he shoved his fingertips between the window and the sill to shove it up as far as he could. Cool night air spilled in the room and he slumped against the wall. His hands traced over his cheeks and he realized he was crying.</p><p>“Shh, you’re okay. Just take a deep breath, okay?”</p><p>He looked up again and saw Dom staring back at him with something unbearably sad in his eyes. His knees were just in the doorframe, not an inch past, but he was leaning into the room with his hands braced on the frame. He wanted to come in. Everything in him was straining to break his own rule and cross the threshold.</p><p>“That’s it,” He said to Brian like he was something small and broken. Right then, he <em>was.</em></p><p>“Can we go?” Brian whispered through a voice that felt like he had gargled glass. He had been screaming. Screaming so loud that Dom had heard him from upstairs.</p><p>Dom stopped talking and just stared at him, “Go where?”</p><p>“Anywhere. Nowhere. I want to drive too fast to think.” Brian said without really thinking about it.</p><p>Dom would say no. He needed to be careful to drive, especially now. One wrong move and he went back to juvie and Dom had made it clear he wasn’t going to let that happen. Why would he risk it on someone crying on the floor, shaking and ready to puke?</p><p>“Okay,” Dom said softly. “Can you stand up?” He stayed kneeling.</p><p>Brian’s hand groped above him for the ledge of the windowsill. He levered himself up slowly and as he rose up Dom did too.</p><p>He wasn’t wearing a shirt or shoes, just a pair of sweatpants. He was shaking in the cold air coming in from the window but it felt good. He never really liked being cold but right then it felt safer. He couldn’t really explain why.</p><p>Instead of waiting for Dom to ask him to get dressed, he staggered across the room and pushed past him to get out of his room. Dom had a shirt on, just a thin wife-beater, and the feeling the warm skin of his arm brush against Brian’s chest made him shiver again.</p><p>He was cold.</p><p>Just cold.</p><p> He heard Dom behind him, walking steadily while Brian couldn’t manage a straight line. There was a creak at the top of the stairs and it was probably Mia. He didn’t turn to look, he just pulled the door open and walked out into the dark night like it was the only thing that could restore sanity. Maybe it was. Maybe nothing could.</p><p>“Me first.” Dom said quietly. “I’ll find us somewhere quiet.”</p><p>It took Brian a second to work through that. He turned and stared at Dom uncomprehendingly.</p><p>“Get in the passenger side.” Dom broke it down slowly, “You can’t drive down this street.”</p><p>In case anyone was watching. He blinked at Dom before he nodded. Then he turned again and wrenched the door open. He practically fell into the seat and then Dom shut the door behind him.</p><p>Immediately, before Dom had even gotten into the car, Brian rolled the window down. He needed the air, the space. Even sitting in a car – the closest Brian felt to home – was too enclosed now. He leaned his head on the door and wrapped his hand around the frame.</p><p>Dom turned the car on and started driving without a word. It was late enough that the clubs had shut down but the morning commute hadn’t started yet. Brian could have just looked at the clock on the dash and known but he didn’t want to tear his eyes away from the street blurring in front of him.</p><p>The lights started getting less and less. Less buildings, less potential for people. The air changed and Brian knew they were getting close to the water.</p><p>“Brian.”</p><p>How long had they been driving? Minutes? An hour? Honestly, the roads kept moving and so Brian didn’t give a shit.</p><p>“Brian, talk to me.”</p><p>He shut his eyes and took a deep breath of sea air. The salty tang of it pulled him back down into himself just a little bit.</p><p>“Brian, come on. You can’t drive until I know you’re okay.”</p><p>A hand gently laid on his bare should and the heat of it was scorching. If his head wasn’t so full of cotton, he would have jumped. Instead he just curled his head in until he was facing Dom better.</p><p>Dom’s eyes went between Brian and the road and his brow was furrowed like Brian was genuinely freaking him out. They pulled over and Dom threw the car in park but neither of them got up to switch seats.</p><p>“I’m fine.” He said quietly.</p><p>“Don’t seem it.” Dom countered.</p><p>He shrugged, “How would you like me to be?”</p><p>“Truthful.”</p><p>Brian stared at him and then just shrugged.</p><p>Dom sighed and leaned back in his seat, his hands gripped the wheel, “What was your dream about?”</p><p>
  <em>Wasn’t a dream. Just a memory.</em>
</p><p>Brian finally straightened up in his own seat, “Don’t remember.”</p><p>“Don’t bother saying things if they aren’t true.” Dom said instantly. His voice was maybe the hardest that Brian had ever heard it. Finally he’d hit some sort of nerve. Lying, who knew?</p><p>“Don’t want to remember.” Brian tried again. Let Dom tell him that was a lie. Sometimes Brian wished he could bleach his brain. Sometimes he felt like he already had.</p><p>Sure enough, Dom didn’t call him out for that. “Was it about your old man?”</p><p>Brian pulled his door open and stepped out in his bare feet over the hard gravelly road. Funny, he hadn’t really noticed it before. He walked around to the other side of the car and Dom was already getting out of his seat. They switched silently and shut their doors like Dom hadn’t just asked him if he was a fucking child who had nightmares about his own personal boogeyman.</p><p>Except that apparently he was and there wasn’t much point to denying it. Dom had clearly already figured it all out, which was mostly Brian’s own fault.</p><p>He threw the car into drive and pulled back onto the road, “He’s an asshole. You probably guessed that. Apparently I’m that fucking pathetic, if that’s what you’re trying to ask.”</p><p>“Not pathetic.” Dom shook his head, “Never.”</p><p>Brian laughed and it almost physically hurt. He pressed down on the gas just a little harder and grinned when the engine roared louder, “You don’t know a goddamn thing about me. You pick the parts you like and make a reflection to cover me up with.”</p><p>Dom seemed incredibly unimpressed with that statement, “You’re so fucking stubborn. You shut down instead of just talking. You lash out when someone pokes at something you don’t like. Sometimes it seems like you’ve got a split personality you’re so bad at figuring out what you want and actually following through before you change your mind.” He listed all of it off so matter of fact, like it wasn’t anything major. “I missing anything?”</p><p>“I’m a coward.” Brian laughed again, “Add that.”</p><p>“How do you figure?”</p><p>
  <em>I let him hit her every day. </em>
</p><p>
  <em>I didn’t save her.</em>
</p><p>
  <em>I never managed to stop him. </em>
</p><p>
  <em>I went to juvie instead of even trying. </em>
</p><p>
  <em>You fucking terrify me.</em>
</p><p>Brian didn’t answer.</p><p>“Tell me if I’m wrong.” Dom started evenly, “Your father doesn’t deserve the title. He did something that you thought you should have been able to stop but you couldn’t. And maybe it was because you physically couldn’t or maybe you were too afraid. Either way doesn’t matter. Am I getting close?”</p><p>Dangerously close but Brian didn’t bother answering. He wasn’t sure what he had been screaming when he was having that nightmare but anything would have been… illuminating.</p><p>Dom took his silence as an answer. He nodded like Brian had actually confirmed it. “A kid shouldn’t have to deal with a terrorist parent. If you couldn’t stop whatever it was, it wasn’t because you were a coward. I’m sorry it happened to you. You’re allowed to be kind of messed up about it. That doesn’t mean you’re a coward either.”</p><p>“You and Mia… <em>fuck</em>, are you reading up on teen trauma in your spare time or something?” Brian bit out. He was angry and he didn’t want to be. Angry meant that Dom’s words meant something and they <em>didn’t</em>. He was spouting shit like usual, no more no less.</p><p>“Of course she does.” Dom sounded amused, “You know how she feels about studying.”</p><p>Right, because Mia was going to be a nurse. He jerked the wheel and let the laugh out when he heard the tires squeal.</p><p>Dom didn’t laugh, “Don’t do that again. We’re not getting pulled over.”</p><p>“Come off it, man. What do you want me around for? Wouldn’t it be easier for you if I just went back to juvie?” Brian couldn’t help but ask. “No more planning who’s gonna babysit your fucked up Mark. No more tip-toeing around your own house. You should want me gone.”</p><p>“Never.” Dom said fiercely. “I will never want you gone.”</p><p>“Then you’re the fucked up one.” Brian answered.</p><p>Dom literally chuckled. “You’re still not getting it. <em>I found you</em>. That’s all I’ve ever really wanted. I’m not fucked, I’m blessed.”</p><p>“You’re high.”</p><p>“And you’ve got about five more minutes before we switch again. Sun will be up soon.” Dom said, cool as could be again.</p><p>It was so goddamn frustrating how Dom could keep his cool while Brian felt like a seething mess of emotions. Dom wasn’t wrong. He couldn’t make up his mind, couldn’t figure out the right way to be. It was exhausting.</p><p>That was turning out to be a trend, though, feeling exhausted. How fucked up was he that he’d probably been the least physically and emotionally exhausted in juvie?</p><p>Brian sped down the still empty streets for another few minutes. Before Dom could tell him to pull over, he did it himself. Better to pretend he had a choice? He didn’t and they both knew it.</p><p>They switched seats again and Brian stayed silent as they sped back to the house.</p><p>Except, he realized as he watched the turns Dom was taking, they weren’t heading back to the house. “Where are we going?”</p><p>“I want to show you something.” Dom said.</p><p>Well, that was cryptic. Brian just leaned his head back instead of pressing for answers. Now that the sun was just starting to lighten the sky, Brian’s body was reminding him that he’d lost a good two hours of sleep and it wasn’t like he was getting the recommended eight hours anyway.</p><p>When the car stopped and Brian opened his eyes, he saw they were at the garage. “I’ve seen this.”</p><p>“Funny, smartass.” Dom opened the door and got out of the car.</p><p>Brian sighed and got out too.</p><p>Dom went ahead of him and unlocked the door. Then the lights came on and he disappeared inside the building before Brian had even gotten to the door. The second he was in, a pair of boots went flying towards his chest. He caught them reflexively.</p><p>“No one likes tetanus.” Dom quipped.</p><p>Brian decided not to think too much about it and pulled them on. The second he straightened back up, a black t-shirt that smelled clean but was definitely Jesse’s came flying at him next. He sighed and pulled it on. The shoulders were a little tight but it worked.</p><p>“No shirt, no shoes, no service? Really?” There was maybe a little bit of a whine in his voice. <em>Maybe</em>.</p><p>“Don’t get me wrong, I liked what I saw and I’m really interested in how you didn’t care that you’ve been half undressed this whole time.” Dom’s voice echoed through the garage. It wasn’t huge but somehow all the metal made it seem more like a cavern. “But eventually you’re gonna remember to care and you’ll freak out. It’s too early for any more of that.”</p><p>Brian stopped dead and felt his cheeks go a little hot.</p><p>“No freaking out.” Dom called.</p><p>“I’m not freaking out.” Brian called back firmly. “And where the fuck are you?”</p><p>“Over here.”</p><p>Brian followed his voice until he found him standing in front of a rough looking shell of a Supra. “Wow,” He said softly as he circled the car.</p><p>“Thought you’d like it.” Dom said with something pleased in his voice.</p><p>“Well, it looks like shit.” Brian started.</p><p>“But it won’t for much longer.” Dom finished.</p><p>He looked up at the other man and found him watching Brian with a grin. His big arms were crossed over his chest and for the first time since they had met all those weeks ago, he remembered that Dom was kind of hot.</p><p>And then Dom chucked one last thing towards him, this time an underhanded toss. That was good though, because he’d thrown a wrench.</p><p>Brian held it in his hands and looked back at the car that needed to be stripped down to its barest parts before anything to could happen to rebuild it.</p><p>“Okay.”</p><p>“Okay?”</p><p>Brian grinned.</p><p>They got to work.</p><p>
  
</p><p>
  <strong>---</strong>
</p><p> </p><p>The rest of the team wandered in a couple of hours later. They got started on their own projects and left him to his. Dom came and went. Customers came in and out. Food got shoved in front of him.</p><p>And Brian worked.</p><p>The sounds of his father’s fists against his mother’s face faded into nothingness. He could barely remember that he’d had a nightmare at all. The weird headspace he had been in earlier cleared out.</p><p>This, <em>this, </em>was what he needed. <em>All </em>he needed, maybe.</p><p> </p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>Next Up: Social workers, Rome, and horrified panic</p><p>Thank you so much for all of the awesome comments you guys have been leaving me. They fuel me like you wouldn't believe. I truly, TRULY, appreciate it and sit there grinning like a fool reading what everyone has to say.</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0007"><h2>7. Chapter Seven</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <hr/>
<p>
  <strong>Chapter Seven </strong>
</p>
<hr/>
<p> </p>
<p>He went to the garage for the rest of the week.</p>
<p>If someone asked for help, he helped but otherwise he stayed with the Supra and no one said a word about it that he heard. No one helped either, except Dom. He couldn’t really mind, though, because it was his car. But it was sort of Brian’s car too. Every once and a while the word ‘<em>their’</em> popped into his head before he let it slide back out. He didn’t care.</p>
<p>
  
</p>
<p>
  <strong>---</strong>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Come on, Brian, your baby will forgive you if you stop for food.” Letty called over to him. She waved a wrapped up grinder in his direction.</p>
<p>That was what they were calling the Supra now – Brian’s baby. He didn’t really mind unless Vince was the one saying it. Then he threw things at him. Apparently that was how he and Vince were destined to communicate. Across a room and always while chucking things at each other.</p>
<p>Vince was maybe not that bad.</p>
<p>Brian grabbed the rag hanging out of his back pocket and wiped his hands slowly. He was hungry, sure, but he was always hungry and he only got a limited amount of time each day to work on the car.</p>
<p>“Brian, lunch.” It was Dom calling him this time and Brian threw the rag down onto the bench beside him and managed to pull himself away.</p>
<p>There was a picnic table out in the side yard that they were all gathering around and as much as Brian would rather be inside working, the sun on his skin felt nice. That was always a downside to juvie, not being able to go outside whenever he wanted.</p>
<p>Brian dropped in a free seat next to Leon, which put him at the end of one side. Dom, of course, got the head of the table so he was sort of right next to Brian. Usually he did whatever he could to avoid it but they were going driving at night like half the week by now and that was way closer than sharing a corner of a picnic table.</p>
<p>Letty dropped down opposite him and purposefully kicked his shin under the table. She liked doing shit like that to stir people up though, so Brian didn’t really mind. That was kind of just Letty.</p>
<p>“You coming to the race tonight, Brian?” Letty asked with a sly grin and her eyes firmly fixed on Dom.</p>
<p>Brian wasn’t dumb, he knew they went drag racing at night. He heard them creeping out, never Dom and Mia at the same time though. Usually not Mia at all. Then in the morning he’d hear whispers about the new players and idiot out of towners that had lost their money to the team. Dom and Letty seemed to be the unbeatable two but honestly he barely heard about Vince or Leon losing either. Jesse had raced only once and he had won by millimeters to hear Letty tell it.</p>
<p>Brian had gone to juvie for boosting cars, not racing them… but that didn’t mean he hadn’t done that too.</p>
<p>At first he hadn’t wanted to go, just because he didn’t want to go anywhere with them. Now though, the old itch was hard to ignore. He knew better though. Driving alone with Dom was one thing. Racing was another. “Ask him,” He jerked his head to Dom and didn’t bother looking up at him. He wasn’t going, not if Dom had anything to say about it and damn did he have <em>everything</em> to say about it.</p>
<p>“You know he can’t, Letty. Don’t jerk him around about it.” Dom said with a flash of warning in his voice.</p>
<p>Vince rolled his eyes and Brian was a little surprised to see a gleam in his eyes that said he <em>wanted</em> Brian to go with them. “When’s the last time that we got caught racing, Dom? Freshman year?”</p>
<p>“Not risking it.” Dom said with finality.</p>
<p>Letty shoved Dom’s arm, “When did you get so boring?”</p>
<p>Brian wasn’t sure why she was bothering to ask – the answer was <em>right around the time that he got saddled with a juvenile offender for a soulmate.</em> If Dom didn’t toe the line then Brian got taken away from him and Dom absolutely didn’t seem like a guy who would take kindly to that sort of thing so… boring it was.</p>
<p>If the look on Dom’s face was anything to go by, he agreed with Brian’s assessment of the question.</p>
<p>Letty just laughed. “Just wait until Brian’s baby is done. You won’t be able to hold him back <em>then.</em>”</p>
<p>Honestly, Brian had just wanted to finish the car. He hadn’t thought about the after. Now that Letty said it though, he could just see it. Racing down a dark street, leaving idiots in cars they didn’t know nearly as well as he knew his own in his dust? That sounded damn good.</p>
<p>“Well, shit, Dom,” Leon starting laughing right along with Letty. “Look at his face. You’re fucked man.”</p>
<p>“Snap out of it, Brian.” Dom said in a low grumble. “It’s not happening. At least not until you turn eighteen.”</p>
<p>“Ooh,” Letty leaned in, excited, “That’s a good idea!”</p>
<p>Vince looked at her with clear interest in his eyes, “Brian racing his baby for his eighteenth?”</p>
<p>Now that <em>did</em> sound kind of awesome.</p>
<p>“Hey,” Leon’s whole voice changed and Brian tensed up just hearing it, “We’ve got company.”</p>
<p>His first thought was one of the other crews that he heard about. Dom’s team and the Trans didn’t seem to get along well at all. Then he caught the look on Dom’s face before he could turn to look himself and he knew that wasn’t what was happening.</p>
<p>Brian turned slowly and stared silently, any bit of excitement for his birthday or his car icing up in a second.</p>
<p>Social workers.</p>
<p>From the state.</p>
<p>One of those spot checks that he’d gotten warned about was finally happening.</p>
<p>Dom stood first, but that wasn’t surprising.</p>
<p>It was a man and a woman wearing a suit and a fugly pantsuit in similar shades of shit brown. He held a briefcase and she had a robotic look on her face that was honestly a little weird.</p>
<p>Brian had dealt with more than a few caseworkers in his time and he’d had the full gamut: tired but trying, tired and done, untrusting, or the by the book kind who saw kids like numbers. Maybe those were just a different breed of <em>tired and done</em> but the effect was way different. Those were the worst ones, maybe. <em>Untrusting</em> he got. Desperate teens weren’t the obedient ones, even for people trying to help. Brian could understand getting burned too many times. He didn’t have a problem with the <em>tired and done</em>s either. They tried but only so far.</p>
<p>He could size them up in seconds, adjust himself as needed. He had two mindless <em>by the book </em>assholes standing before him. They’d hand you back to the person who stabbed you if it got your file off their desk and the rules allowed it.</p>
<p>Brian braced himself.</p>
<p>“Can I help you?” Dom called as soon as they got close enough to hear him. They were still a good three feet away from a regular conversations’ distance and even further away from Brian. Dom stood between them like an immovable wall.</p>
<p>“Dominic Toretto, I assume?” Suit said without much inflection.</p>
<p>Dom nodded to them once and crossed his arms, “I am,” He said evenly.</p>
<p>Pantsuit gestured to herself and then her partner, “I’m Karen Brock and this is Craig Dennison, we’re with the state and are assigned to Brian O’Conner’s case now that he’s out with you.” She held out a business card and Dom waited a full thirty seconds before he took it.</p>
<p>“Can I help you?” Dom repeated.</p>
<p>“We’re here to check on Brian.” Pantsuit continued. She looked past Dom and found Brian easily enough that he knew she had read up on his file before she had come and had taken a good long look at the accompanying picture. So thorough.</p>
<p>Dom stepped about two inches to the left so they could see Brian just enough, “Brian’s good.”</p>
<p>If they were looking for Brian to chime in somewhere here, they were going to have to ask him directly and make sure to word it so he couldn’t just shake or nod his head.</p>
<p>“Is this where Brian spends most of his days?” Suit asked while he looked around and seemed less than impressed. He probably drove a Lexus.</p>
<p>“Yeah,” Letty whispered, “Chillin' out maxin' relaxin' all cool.”</p>
<p>Brian snorted as quietly as he could. He was fine making fun of Suit and Pantsuit but he’d honestly rather not have their attention focused on him. Let Dom have that fun.</p>
<p>If Dom heard them, and he probably had, he didn’t let on. Instead, he just nodded cool as could be, “Here. Sometimes a store my family owns.”</p>
<p>“And when he’s there…?” Pantsuit asked. <em>Who’s his jailer there?</em></p>
<p>Dom’s shoulders tensed and Brian knew that not only had he heard the real question, he was feeling that word <em>hard</em>, “My sister runs the store.” </p>
<p>“And after work?” Pantsuit pressed.</p>
<p>
  <em>I sleep in a shack out back. No, I lay down with the pigs in the barn. Wait, I sleep under the fourth underpass between here and store and whoever picks me up first in the morning gets the pleasure of my company for the day. </em>
</p>
<p>“He comes home with me.” Dom answered easily.</p>
<p>“Brian,” Pantsuit called to him. Interestingly, she didn’t try to step closer. Dom wasn’t doing anything aggressive but apparently she was better at reading body language than she seemed. “Where’s your bedroom?”</p>
<p>“First floor,” Brian said, “Off the kitchen.”</p>
<p>“What do you like best about it?”</p>
<p>
  <em>It’s not a sex dungeon. </em>
</p>
<p>“Big windows.” Brian said truthfully.</p>
<p>“May we take a tour of the garage? See what Brian’s working on?” Suit asked.</p>
<p>Without a word, Dom turned and led them inside the garage. After a few seconds, Brian could hear the low rumble of his voice, pointing things out and giving them a proper tour.</p>
<p>“God, they’re probably a lot of fun at parties.” Leon laughed, “That guy looks like the living embodiment of elevator music.”</p>
<p>“We’re lucky Jesse’s not here today,” Vince added, “If they saw him being all twitchy Brian would be peeing in a cup as we speak.”</p>
<p>He had certainly done enough of that in his day, one more time wouldn’t mean much. Still, that meant going with them and he wasn’t interested at all. The sooner they got what they wanted and left them the fuck alone, the better. Then Brian could get back to the Supra, which was pretty much all he wanted.</p>
<p>“Dom will get them out of here as fast as he can,” Letty said with enough certainty in her voice that Brian caught himself relaxing just a little. She didn’t look at him when she said it but he knew she’d said it just for him.</p>
<p>They were getting better at reading him and he wasn’t sure how he felt about it.</p>
<p>“Yeah, can you imagine what that’ll do to our image if someone spies that shitty car out front?” Leon added, like that was what anyone was worried about. He was giving Brian an out, maybe giving them all an out. He hadn’t failed to notice that they were all kind of tense.</p>
<p>After a few minutes of the three of them cracking jokes and watching him <em>not</em> eat his grinder, Dom walked back out with Suit and Pantsuit right behind him.</p>
<p>“Brian,” Pantsuit said, “Is there anything you need to discuss while we’re here?”</p>
<p>He shook his head.</p>
<p>“Great,” Suit said with such fake enthusiasm Brian almost barfed. “Last thing is to set up a visit with your father.”</p>
<p>Brian froze.</p>
<p>“I told you no last time.” Dom said in seconds. “It’s still a no.”</p>
<p>There was a new undercurrent of tension that Brian could feel down to his bones. Not just him and Dom, but the others too. He could feel their eyes on him, Suit and Pantsuit too, and he just stared over Letty’s head at the clouds above. He knew his face was blank but that was on purpose.</p>
<p>“Mr. O’Conner - ” Suit started.</p>
<p>Dom’s voice was dead cold when he cut the man off, “Can ask all he wants. We’re not interested.”</p>
<p>Brian wasn’t sure he would ever understand what his father was doing this for. Maybe if he had ended up with a soulmate who was like Bill Gates or something, that would make more sense. His old man wanting the money he could milk out of that kind of connection was something Brian could understand. Expect, even. Dom wasn’t hurting but he wasn’t a millionaire either.</p>
<p>So what did his father want with him <em>now?</em></p>
<p>Why was he still asking?</p>
<p>Everyone around him was still talking but Brian tuned them out. He wanted to go back to the Supra. He wanted to drown out his own thoughts with the sound of metal on metal and whatever music they cranked up. He couldn’t move, though, not until Suit and Pantsuit went the fuck away. He wasn’t getting drawn into some discussion with them, not about his dad and not about Dom.</p>
<p>“They’re leaving,” Leon poked his hand, “Shit, Brian, they’re leaving okay?”</p>
<p>He stood up and left his grinder with two bites taken out of it and walked back into the garage.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>---</strong>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“I’m sorry.”</p>
<p>Brian jerked his head up, eyes meeting Letty’s in something like wild surprise. Letty <em>did not</em> apologize. If anything, she fucked around with people with goddamn <em>glee.</em> “What?”</p>
<p>“Close your mouth, idiot.” She said and Brian abruptly realized his mouth <em>was</em> kind of half open. He shut it and she scuffed the toe of her big black books onto his doorframe. She’d pushed his door open without knocking, which broke Dom’s rules, but she wasn’t actually coming in so…?</p>
<p>“You’re sorry about what?” Brian leaned back against the wall his bed was set against. He had a car magazine in his lap, another one that had gotten shoved under his door a couple of days ago. What exactly Dom was playing at, Brian still wasn’t sure. This time, he’d shoved under a Hershey’s bar too.</p>
<p>Letty glanced up at him, annoyed.</p>
<p>“What?” Brian asked again, “You’re sorry you kicked me at dinner? You’re sorry you didn’t help with the dishes?”</p>
<p>Letty scoffed, “Of course not.”</p>
<p>“Yeah,” Brian rolled his eyes. He wasn’t annoyed so much as resigned, “Why would you bother doing dishes, right? It’s not like you ever cook.”</p>
<p>“Mia’s got stupid standards.” Letty shot back like she always did, “If she wants her dishes cleaned a certain way she can do them herself.”</p>
<p>It was an old argument between them. Brian thought it was rude to not even offer and Letty thought that Mia had too high of standards because she wanted all the food chipped off the plates and all the grease cleared off pans. Brian knew that Letty lived in her older sister’s garage apartment and he had literally never wanted to go to a place less. Even Leon and Jesse’s apartment had to be better.</p>
<p>Letty seemed like she was gearing up to hash it out again but Brian just raised an eyebrow at her.</p>
<p>“Don’t play stupid on purpose, asshole.” Letty shot at him.</p>
<p>“You’ve apologized to no one ever.” Brian reminded her like it wasn’t common knowledge. “I’m allowed to be surprised. Be more specific.”</p>
<p>Letty’s glare just got sharper but he could sort of see something else lurking in the way she scuffed her shoe again and shifted her weight in the doorway. She wasn’t playing some joke on him, he realized. She was really apologizing for something and she was damned uncomfortable about it.</p>
<p>“I was a dick.” Letty said finally. She directed it to Brian’s window, not to him. “That call you got, when you asked Dom to tell them no…”</p>
<p>
  <em>Oh.</em>
</p>
<p>He hadn’t really thought that they would think that far back and connect the dots that Suit and Pantsuit had laid down when they came to the garage that afternoon. Or mostly he just hadn’t thought about it at all. No one said anything at least and Brian hadn’t either.</p>
<p>“It’s fine, Letty.” Brian said softly. It was. She hadn’t known and it wasn’t like she’d said anything really nasty.</p>
<p>“It’s not.” Letty didn’t take the out. That was even weirder. She <em>always</em> took the out. Hell, she invented them for herself if no one gave her one. “You were freaking out and asking him for help and I just threw it in your face how you weren’t trustworthy, like we’re angels.”</p>
<p>“Okay,” Brian said slowly, “You’re a massive bitch but I forgive you?”</p>
<p>Letty let out a surprised bark of laughter and finally turned to make eye contact with Brian. “You’re better than I thought you’d be, you know?”</p>
<p>He wasn’t really sure what to say in response to that. Thanks? What had she thought he was going to be? The curiosity was there but mostly he figured it was best not to know. “Gee, thanks Letty.” He settled on, just for self-preservation.</p>
<p>“Your bedroom is boring.” And then she shut the door.</p>
<p>
  <em>This family was fucking weird.</em>
</p>
<p>
  
</p>
<p>
  <strong>---</strong>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>On the morning of Brian’s official four month anniversary, Mia packed him a crust-free tuna salad sandwich to take with him to the garage and Brian’s first thought was <em>Sweet!</em></p>
<p>His second thought was <em>What the fuck?</em></p>
<p>Slowly, he realized that he had been going to the garage with Dom for weeks. His Supra was coming together slowly but surely. He helped the others with the cars for actual clients and he sat with Jesse at his computer to bask in his brilliance and he even signed for the occasional delivery. He got a vote in the music choice for the day. They didn’t need to ask him what he wanted for lunch anymore, because they already knew.</p>
<p>When the fuck had that happened? <em>How</em> had it happened?</p>
<p>“You okay?” Leon whispered to his right and Brian realized he’d stopped shoveling eggs in his mouth so he could silently freak out about how stupidly predictable he had gotten.</p>
<p>Luckily, no one else seemed to notice. Not with the way that Jesse was talking a mile a minute about some girl Letty had fought with at a bar the night before. He was doing one of his dramatic retellings that were funny but crazy hard to follow.</p>
<p>“Yeah,” Brian said back, just to keep Leon from alerting the others. They seemed to trade off paying attention to him, as though he still needed babysitters. It was probably going to stay like that until he turned eighteen and even then he figured they were going to have a hard time switching it off for a few months after.</p>
<p>Wait.</p>
<p>What. The. <em>Fuck</em>?</p>
<p>Brian dropped his fork onto the table.</p>
<p>When had his plans changed to <em>stay?</em> The plan had been to blow out of California and as far away from Dominic Toretto as he could the second the legal system didn’t have a say in it.</p>
<p>No, the plan <em>was still. </em>There was no <em>had been</em>. There was no past tense old plan. There was just <em>the </em>plan. The plan he wasn’t giving up. The plan that was keeping him sane.</p>
<p>Except he sort of felt saner than he had in years and he’d forgotten about the goddamn plan so…</p>
<p>“Brian?”</p>
<p>Brian blinked and realized he’d turned his traitor head and was staring straight at Dom. He didn’t want to know what his face looked like. “I’m fine,” He said even though no one had actually asked and then he stood up even though he didn’t have a thought beyond <em>be alone</em>. “I’ll be on the porch when you’re ready to go.” The words came out even and calm. At least they sounded better than he felt.</p>
<p>He walked away and no one stopped him. Not even Mia tried to say something about how he’d left half his breakfast behind. What he’d managed to eat felt like lead in his stomach as he dropped down into one of the chairs out on the front porch. It was still kind of cool out but the sun was going to burn that away soon.</p>
<p>Breathe in.</p>
<p>Breathe out.</p>
<p>This wasn’t a big deal. So he didn’t hate Dom, that was actually not so bad. When he left California and he inevitably got into shit in some other part of the world and someone called his on-the-record-Mark, he wasn’t going to get screwed over.</p>
<p>Slowly, Brian felt himself calm down.</p>
<p>As long as no one got in his face about what had happened in the kitchen, he could probably stay that way.</p>
<p>Everything was going to be fine.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>---</strong>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>No one asked but Dom watched him like a creep from the other side of the room all day.</p>
<p>Usually, Dom liked to check up on the Supra at some point in the day half out of actual interest and half just to interact with Brian. He had clocked the habit weeks ago and let it happen because it was Dom’s goodwill that bought him the parts he needed.</p>
<p>Dom didn’t come by though.</p>
<p>Brian didn’t let it bother him because it <em>didn’t</em> bother him.</p>
<p>It didn’t.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>---</strong>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <em>“Brian! Wake the fuck up!” </em>
</p>
<p>Someone open hand slapped his door and Brian jerked awake with a pounding heart.</p>
<p>
  <em>“Leave him alone, Vince.” </em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>“No way! Team party, mandatory attendance. Your princess isn’t sacred.” </em>
</p>
<p>Brian stumbled to the door, still half asleep, and practically ripped it open, “I might punch you.”</p>
<p>Vince gave him a shit eating grin and fanned out a whole slew of hundred dollar bills to wave in his face like he was some swooning chick in those shit books they had to read in school. “Awake yet, Sleeping Beauty?”</p>
<p>“Sleeping Beauty?” Brian deadpanned, “You wake guys up in the middle of the night and call them beautiful while you wave money in their faces and they might get the wrong idea, Vince.”</p>
<p>Just for a split second, Vince’s whole face froze and he sort of sputtered. Dom laughed though, so that was something.</p>
<p>“Don’t be an ass,” Vince finally managed to spit out. “Get dressed. We’re celebrating.”</p>
<p>“Celebrating what?” Even as he said it he was turning around to find a shirt, “You finally get a girl to say yes to you or something?”</p>
<p>“You’re an even bigger asshole at two in the morning, I didn’t think that was possible.” Vince bitched. The money in his hand must have been keeping his temper pretty even though because the grin came back in seconds and he waved the wad of cash at Brian again like he’d forgotten it was there, “I scored big at the race tonight.”</p>
<p>“You don’t have to come if you don’t want.” Dom offered.</p>
<p>Then, Dom got shoved by Vince and Brian almost had to do a double-take. Apparently Vince really was riding high because who actually shoved Dom?</p>
<p>“Yes, he does. Mia is getting dressed too. The hermits are coming with us.”</p>
<p>Lucky for him, Brian was already sliding his shoes on, so there wasn’t much chance that he was going to say no by then. Some part of him that still and would probably always love messing with Vince wanted to get back in bed and flip him off but he could hear the others in the living room laughing and he kind of did want to go with them, especially if Vince was paying. “So where are we going?”</p>
<p>Dom immediately shot him a look that Brian wasn’t sure how to read. Or at least, he wasn’t sure what it meant until Vince grinned.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>---</strong>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Buffalo wings.</p>
<p>They went to an all night wings place.</p>
<p>Buffalo sauce with bleu cheese didn’t sound great at two am but they were actually pretty awesome.</p>
<p>They tasted even better when Vince paid for them.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>---</strong>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Honestly, Brian wasn’t so surprised when Rome pulled into the garage. If anything, he was surprised it had taken so long.</p>
<p>His only real regret was that he had been over with Jesse when Rome strolled in, because that meant he hadn’t gotten to see Rome meet Letty and judging by the weird looks passing between them, it had been pretty spectacular.</p>
<p>“What took you so fucking long?” Rome half-barked at him when he came out because in the middle of one of Jesse’s rambles Brian had registered a familiar laugh in the middle of all the Team Toretto noise.</p>
<p>He cocked an eyebrow at Rome, “What took <em>you</em> so fucking long?”</p>
<p>This time, Rome didn’t grab him in a hug. That was kind of interesting and Brian wasn’t sure if it was because he was more focused on Letty or if he’d figured out which guy was Dom and decided not to chance it. Both seemed likely with Rome.</p>
<p>“Had I been informed you were hanging with such a dope girl, I’d have come sooner.” Rome said half to Brian and half to Letty. “What happened to having your brother’s back, Bri?”</p>
<p>“He flirted with Mia too,” Brian told Letty, “Keep that in mind.”</p>
<p>Rome shook his head before Letty got a chance to say anything, “Nah, don’t get me wrong,”  He turned and pointed specifically at Dom, “Mia’s gorgeous but she kind of gives off a vibe that says she’d get off quizzing me on algebra, you know? We wouldn’t be compatible. Now, Miss Letty here…”</p>
<p>“Miss Letty spits boys like you out for fun every week.” Dom said in a low voice with his arms crossed. He looked intimidating and annoyed but everything from the words he spoke to the voice he said them in said he was mostly amused. Under no circumstances would Dom want his sister with Rome, so he was hardly going to get upset if Rome essentially said she was too smart for him.</p>
<p>And they all had fun watching Letty circle fresh prey, so that was no problem either.</p>
<p>The grin on Rome’s face said he didn’t think he’d mind that too much.</p>
<p>“Dude,” Vince shoved Brian’s arm, “Just go show him your baby or something. We’ve got shit to do, in case everyone’s forgotten.” At least half of that was exclusively for Letty.</p>
<p>Brian shot a look to Rome and didn’t bother doing it behind Vince’s back either.</p>
<p>Rome didn’t rise to that bait. Instead he said, “Your baby?”</p>
<p>With a grin, Brian grabbed Rome’s arm and steered him over to the Supra. It still needed all the good finishing stuff but someone like Rome wouldn’t need to see flashy colors to admire what was in front of him. And, with a low whistle, Rome got right down to the admiring part.</p>
<p>“That’s a pretty baby all right.” Rome leaned over the hood and took a long look.</p>
<p>Brian instantly started spouting off all the stats, as if Rome couldn’t see most of it for himself. And as much as Rome liked to hear himself talk, he kept quiet while Brian did it. There had to be some sort of rule in the Bro Code about it, or something.</p>
<p>
  <em>#22: Thou shalt shut the fuck up and listen to thy bro wax poetic about his car.</em>
</p>
<p>Or something like that.</p>
<p>“I can’t wait get her racing.” Brian finished his spiel with such enthusiasm he almost had to check himself.</p>
<p>Rome straightened back up, “You’re gonna race in it?”</p>
<p>“Isn’t that what I just said?” Brian snarked, “Of course I’m going to take this beast out for races. As soon as I turn eighteen and…”</p>
<p><em>Oh</em>.</p>
<p>And again, there it was. Stay or leave. Rome had automatically assumed that Brian was building his getaway car.</p>
<p>“You’ll leave all those out of town assholes in your dust.” Rome said supportively. His eyes clocked the change in Brian but he had the decency not to say anything else. Then he started talking about paint colors and spoiler sizes, giving the sort of outrageous suggestions that Brian would have expected, but he wasn’t paying attention and he didn’t really think he was meant to.</p>
<p>Brian hadn’t really thought about what he wanted the Supra to be, honestly. It had just started as something to keep himself sane. Somewhere along the line everyone, including Dom and Brian, had acknowledged that the car was his. His to run away with. His to race for Team Toretto. And yeah, they’d joked about Brian racing it when he turned eighteen but those thoughts hadn’t really sparked the others. The running away with it ones.</p>
<p>Damn Rome for putting this shit into his head, for making him realize that not even the Supra could be safely loved. If he ran, the car was half Dom’s. Dom’s money, at least. A lot of Dom’s sweat and time.</p>
<p>If he stayed…</p>
<p>He couldn’t stay. </p>
<p> </p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>Next Up: Dom gets a little impatient </p>
<p>Feedback is love :)</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0008"><h2>8. Chapter Eight</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <hr/>
<p>
  <strong>Chapter Eight</strong>
</p>
<hr/>
<p> </p>
<p>“Rome’s a good guy.” Dom said later that night as the team started trickling out the door or into their own rooms. Only Jesse remained behind, already asleep on the couch. Leon might come back for him later or he might not. It had gone both ways before.</p>
<p>For his part, Brian was ready to keel over. The rest of the afternoon after Rome left had been weird. He’d helped Letty with a car instead of working on the Supra and for the first time, he didn’t spend the entire time longing to get back to work on it.</p>
<p>“Yeah,” Brian said shortly. He finished drying the last of the dishes and set it down in the stack already in the cabinet.</p>
<p>“You should warn him not to bother with Letty.” Dom suggested half-heartedly. “Or don’t. It’s always fun to watch.”</p>
<p>Brian snorted and that was about as much as he wanted to contribute to the conversation.</p>
<p>“So what did he say?” Dom asked after it got obvious that Brian wasn’t adding anything else. His voice was a little harder than before but not too much. Not enough that Brian felt the need to warn Rome to stay away.</p>
<p>He glanced back at Dom and found him in his usual crossed arm stance. He even looked kind of tense, which was interesting. “What did Rome say about what?”</p>
<p>“That’s what I’m asking. You got all weird halfway through him being there and you’ve been weird ever since.”</p>
<p>Brian didn’t freeze up. There wasn’t anything <em>to </em>freeze up about. What Rome had said didn’t really matter. It was what was happening in Brian’s head that was the problem. “Nothing important.”</p>
<p>“I thought I told you not to bother saying things that aren’t true.” Dom reminded almost monotone. Hard as ice and about as warm as.</p>
<p>He threw the towel he was using to dry the dishes down onto the counter. “How’s this, what Rome said and what I’m being weird about are none of your goddamn business.”</p>
<p>“I think we both know it is.” Dom countered. “Everything about you is my business.” There was something caveman in those words that just raised Brian’s hackles higher.</p>
<p>Without really thinking, Brian surged forward and put himself right in Dom’s face, “You,” He said with a low voice dripping with distain, “Don’t own me. You never will.”</p>
<p>“Maybe, maybe not.” Dom shrugged and his intense eyes bored into Brian. There was something there that Brian hadn’t ever really seen before but he didn’t know what it was. All these months he had spent analyzing every hint of Dom’s emotions, ready to find the ones that meant danger, and now he suddenly couldn’t read him right? The next words out of Dom’s mouth took the anger out of Brian’s gut and filled it with something icy instead. “If I ever do though, don’t be so scared. You already own me.”</p>
<p>Dom said it so evenly, like it was nothing. Like Brian owning some part of him, all of him maybe, wasn’t anything major. Or maybe it wasn’t that it was <em>nothing</em>… big didn’t have to mean <em>bad. </em>Maybe Dom just meant it like it was already a fact. You don’t get upset about gravity, it just <em>is.</em></p>
<p>And then the look in Dom’s eyes made more sense to Brian. He could see what he hadn’t been able to place and the realization was so abrupt he wasn’t sure how he hadn’t caught on faster. The only reason he hadn’t, honestly, was because it hadn’t ever really been there before.</p>
<p>
  <em>Impatience. </em>
</p>
<p>Brian took two full steps back from Dom but he almost literally couldn’t pull his eyes away. He wanted to say something back, wanted to make sure that Dom didn’t think he’d rattled him. Except he sort of had and it was going to be hard to pretend otherwise.</p>
<p>This entire time, Dom had been playing the long game. For months, Brian had been waiting for Dom’s patience to run out. He’d thought that meant getting thrown down to the ground and fucked whether he liked it or not. That, he had sort of been prepared for. As much as anyone could be, at least.</p>
<p>So the change should have freaked him out, and it did but for different reasons.</p>
<p>Dom wasn’t impatient for <em>sex</em>, he was getting impatient for <em>love.</em></p>
<p>He was getting impatient waiting for Brian’s <em>fire</em>, for his truth, for his passion. He wanted way more than Brian knew how to give, mostly because he’d never really seen it or felt it himself.</p>
<p>The silence between them felt dangerous and Brian knew exactly why. Dom did too and that was even worse. Without a word, Brian turned his back on Dom and left the room altogether. As he closed the door to his bedroom, he realized his heart was pounding.</p>
<p>Once, months ago when Brian had been sure that all Dom wanted him for was pleasure and pain, he could have laughed in Dom’s face. His heart wouldn’t be pounding, he wouldn’t have backed down so easy.</p>
<p>Because the answer then would have been that there was no chance of Brian falling in love with Dom. None whatsofuckingever.</p>
<p><em>What was worse</em>, Brian thought a little hysterically as he sank down onto his knees right on the floor, <em>that I can’t swear I’ll never love him…</em></p>
<p>
  <em>Or that Dom knows it?</em>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>---</strong>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>The next week was kind of like a blur. Letty and Vince complained loudly about the return of Brian-the-Mute, Jesse focused all his energy on drawing up plans for the Supra because that was the only thing Brian would talk about, and Mia started making all his favorites for dinner because he’d been sitting there pushing the food around on the plate for the most part.</p>
<p>But Dom pretended that nothing was different.</p>
<p>That should have helped but it didn’t.</p>
<p>
  <em>Stay or go, stay or go, stay or go?</em>
</p>
<p>The question echoed around in his head every goddamn minute.</p>
<p>
  <em>Don’t like Mia’s food too much because you’re leaving and you don’t want to miss it. </em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>Don’t blow off the team because then they’ll have to forgive you when you stay. </em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>Don’t talk to Dom because if you figure out you could love him it’ll be harder to go. </em>
</p>
<p>What the fuck was he supposed to do?</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>---</strong>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>It was three in the goddamn morning on a Sunday when Dom threw his keys at Brian’s sleeping head. He jolted out of the bed and batted his hand over his hair half convinced he’d find a huge-ass spider in it. Why that was his first thought when spiders weren’t metal and their legs didn’t jangle together, he couldn’t really say.</p>
<p>Once he realized that one, there was no spider and two, that Dom’s keys were in his hands he managed to blink up at Dom with what he hoped was a lot of venom in his eyes.</p>
<p>“Get up.” Dom said as if Brian was being particularly slow. Like he should have been ready to go five minutes ago, except Brian was pretty sure there wasn’t a three a.m. road trip on his calendar for today so what the hell was this about?</p>
<p>“What?” Brian said a little dumbly. So sue him, he’d been dead asleep a minute ago.</p>
<p>Dom waved his hand towards the front of the house impatiently, “Get up.” He repeated.</p>
<p>Almost automatically, Brian slid out of his bed and stood swaying for a second before his eyes hit his shoes and he sat back down on the edge of the bed to pull them on over his bare feet. “I have no idea what’s going on.”</p>
<p>“Obviously,” Dom huffed, “You need to chill the fuck out.”</p>
<p>Brian stood up again and reached for the shirt he’d taken off a few hours ago. “What are you talking about?”</p>
<p>“I’m talking about whatever funk you’ve been stuck in.” Dom said like he didn’t know exactly what that funk was and why it had started. He was playing dumb, the asshole. “You chill out when you drive, so great, let’s go drive. Think through whatever you’re panicking about. Or don’t, just drive and remember how breathing works. I don’t care.”</p>
<p>Except he did care or he wouldn’t be standing in Brian’s doorway.</p>
<p>“You’re so goddamn dramatic sometimes.” Dom bitched and Brian wasn’t sure he’d ever really seen this side of Dominic Toretto before. Dom turned around and started walking but he was still talking so Brian just followed behind him silently. He didn’t even have enough respect for everyone else’s sleep to whisper like a regular person would have. “What do you think, you need to figure out your entire life in a month? Is this shutting down thing negotiable or something? Can you give me a warning so we can avoid it?”</p>
<p>Brian followed Dom out into the cool night air with his mouth half open. That was a lot of words coming out of Dom’s mouth all at once. Was he supposed to answer any of that?</p>
<p>Before Brian could figure that out, Dom slid into the driver’s seat and Brian got into the car on the passenger side, same as they usually did when Brian got to drive. They’d switch when they got out of the neighborhood.</p>
<p>Tonight, Dom drove way longer than he would have usually. Or at least longer than he had any of the other times he’d agreed to let Brian drive.</p>
<p>Maybe Brian wasn’t the only one who needed to think.</p>
<p>“Out with it,” Dom said finally. He didn’t sound any more himself than he had when he’d thrown the keys.</p>
<p>“What do you want me to say?” Brian sniped back, because he could.</p>
<p>Dom nearly growled at him and the sound did weird things to him. It was like a shiver going down to his fingertips and Brian felt a different kind of jolt then because how dare <em>he</em> like <em>Dom’s</em> fire?</p>
<p>“What is it?” Dom demanded, “You were better. You were with us. You were fucking perfect. Every day you got even better. Now we’re nearly back where we started. What the fuck, Brian?”</p>
<p>Brian’s jaw clenched and he huffed out a heavy breath through his nose that sounded nearly as angry as Dom did. If this conversation was Dom wanted then fuck, they’d have it. “I want to race my car for my eighteenth.”</p>
<p>There was a long moment of silence, only the roar of the engine to cut through the silence.</p>
<p>“The fuck are you talking about?” Dom said finally.</p>
<p>“I want to race my car for my eighteenth.” Brian repeated dully. The anger was burning off and he felt stupider the longer the words were floating between them.</p>
<p>“And you think <em>what</em>?” Dom wasn’t getting it. “You turn eighteen and the threat of juvie is gone. You think I’m gonna tell you no even then?”</p>
<p>Brian clenched his jaw and said it again as though each word hurt. Each word <em>did</em> hurt. “I want to race my car for my eighteenth. They said it and I wanted it. I said it to Rome when I showed him. I <em>want</em> it.”</p>
<p>Brian wasn’t even looking at Dom. Dom wasn’t looking at him. They were both staring at the dark stretch of road through the windshield, empty and all theirs.</p>
<p>He didn’t need to look at his Mark to know that he understood finally.</p>
<p>“That’s okay, Brian.” Dom said slowly but they both knew there wasn’t much point in him saying it.</p>
<p>“It’s not.” Brian laughed raggedly, “Fuck, Dom, it’s <em>not.</em>”</p>
<p>“Would it be so bad?” Dom said softly and suddenly Brian pitied him. Stone Cold Dominic Toretto, finally laid down low by his selfish Soulmark. Finally the vulnerable one.</p>
<p>Brian pressed his head against the back of the seat and stared up at nothing. “No,” He admitted, “And that just makes it worse.”</p>
<p>“Tell me what to do.” Those words coming out of Dom’s mouth sounded so odd but for some strange reason they made him more human. They’d been on such uneven footing this entire time. Dom the jailer, Brian ready to run. Dom cool calm and collected, Brian a seething mess. Dom older and wiser. Brian young and hurt.</p>
<p>Brian wasn’t wired to be like Dom. To be so chill and sure. Still, he hated knowing he was always going to be the one… the one who…? The one who what? Needed to be coddled? Was unsure? Wasn’t the stronger one?</p>
<p>None of that made sense. It wasn’t true. He just hated that they weren’t even but he didn’t know what them being even looked like. He wasn’t sure he’d like it better if they were.</p>
<p>Dom hadn’t been wrong. He didn’t know what he wanted long enough to do anything about it before he frantically changed his mind.</p>
<p>This Dom, though, he was pretty sure he was the only one who had ever seen this. That made it easier to answer.</p>
<p>“I don’t know.” Brian said truthfully. “But if I did… If I did, I’d tell you.”</p>
<p>Dom’s hands went tighter around the steering wheel and Brian knew he got it.</p>
<p>
  <em>I’m maybe too fucked up to love you. I might never be happy with you. </em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>But if I knew how to be that person, I’d tell you. </em>
</p>
<p>“What are you so scared will happen?” Dom pressed harder. His knuckles were white, he was clenching his fists around the wheel so tight.</p>
<p>Brian shrugged, “I don’t even know anymore. Sometimes nothing. Sometimes everything.”</p>
<p>Dom didn’t say anything.</p>
<p>“I don’t trust you.” Brian kept talking quietly, “I don’t trust myself. I think if I don’t leave we’ll end up hating each other. I think one day you’ll snap and ruin me, if I let you. I think I’ll ruin you, and I think you’d let me. I’m not meant for this shit, Dom. I’m not right. I can’t be.”</p>
<p>“The hell you aren’t.” Dom said it with a voice so hard it almost physically hurt to hear. “The hell you aren’t, Brian.”</p>
<p>“Do you really want to do this shit forever?”Brian asked. “I mean, be serious Dom. Think it through. What if I never really trust you? What if I always flinch away? What if I keep hurting you and your family because I <em>want</em> to?”</p>
<p>Dom shook his head and for a second Brian felt his heart stop. “That’s not what this is.” He said instead and Brian just sighed.</p>
<p>The car pulled over to the side of the road and for once Brian had literally no idea where they were.</p>
<p>“Four months ago you never would have said this shit to me.” Dom turned in his seat to finally face Brian. “You barely even looked at me.”</p>
<p>“Because I hated you.” Brian said.</p>
<p>Dom didn’t miss a beat. “Do you still?”</p>
<p><em>“No.” </em>It was the truth. It should have been a hard thing to say but it wasn’t.</p>
<p>“Once, you would have said you’d hate me forever.” Dom said evenly.</p>
<p>That was true, more true than Dom realized. Brian understood what he was getting at. If it took Brian less than six months to decide that he didn’t hate him when he’d been so sure he would forever, how could Brian leave sure that he would never love Dom?</p>
<p>“Okay, let’s say you’re right.” Brian felt a sick twist in his stomach and his eyes drifted from Dom’s earnest, intense face and down to the swirling Mark on his arm. It was funny, he hardly ever looked at it. He hardly ever acknowledged the thing. Such a small stretch of skin to have tied them together so thoroughly.</p>
<p>The words got heavier the longer he stared at Dom’s Mark. “Do you think that me loving you is me staying? I said it to you before…” Back in the bathroom, back in aftermath of the first time he had asked Dom for help.</p>
<p>“You’re not your father.”</p>
<p>Brian laughed.</p>
<p>“I don’t need protecting.”</p>
<p>The laugh went sour. Maybe, maybe not.</p>
<p>“Listen to me.” Dom cupped his hand to his cheek and turned Brian’s head to look at him again. His touch was warm and careful but sure and strong too. It felt stupid but Brian almost leaned into it. “Brian, we are not your parents. I’m sorry shit went bad between them. I’m sorry you had to live like that. I’m sorry for however it ended. But baby, we aren’t them. One of us isn’t destined to be the monster and the other the victim.”</p>
<p><em>Baby</em>.</p>
<p>The last person to call him that had been his mother. What a fucking time for the comparison.</p>
<p>“If you loved me and I didn’t hurt you, that wouldn’t mean that <em>you’d</em> hurt <em>me</em>. You said I’d let you, you’re wrong.” Dom rubbed one calloused thumb over Brian’s cheekbone, “Nothing’s gonna hurt me worse than seeing you hurt anyway.”</p>
<p>Brian shut his eyes.</p>
<p>“We’re sitting here because seeing you hurting was hurting me.” Dom’s words were careful and cautious. Not because he was afraid of being called out for being weak or hurt or <em>the victim</em> but because he seemed to sense how important it was that he explain it right. “Did I let you keep it up? Did I let you hurt me worse? Did I let it fester between us? No. We’re here. We’re talking. We’re not throwing punches, we’re not making it hurt worse.”</p>
<p>Was Dom trying to say they were, like, a healthy relationship or something? Communication and all that shit? The thought made Brian’s lips turn up, just enough that he felt better about opening his eyes back up.</p>
<p>Instantly, his eyes met Dom’s.</p>
<p>“Is that how your parents worked?” He asked even though he knew the answer.</p>
<p>“No.” Brian answered.</p>
<p><em>See?</em> Dom’s eyes said. <em>We’re not like them. We never will be.</em></p>
<p>He believed it.</p>
<p>Brian didn’t.</p>
<p>He <em>couldn’t</em>.</p>
<p>Something shifted in Dom’s eyes and Brian saw him settle back into his nearly heroic patience. His hand pressed harder to Brian’s cheek for just another second before he pulled back and opened his car door. He stood up and Brian was still sitting there, the skin warmed by Dom’s hand going cold.</p>
<p>Dom had said what he wanted to say. He had made the points he wanted to make.</p>
<p>And now he wanted Brian to drive and think.</p>
<p>Brian didn’t bother getting out of the car, he just shifted over to the driver’s seat. Dom got in beside him and shut his door.</p>
<p>The motions were mechanical. How many times had they done this? More than Brian had ever expected.</p>
<p>Dom had always been different than what he had thought his Mark would be.</p>
<p>He put the car in gear and started driving. He didn’t speak and neither did Dom.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>---</strong>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Things weren’t less weird at breakfast. If that was Dom’s goal then he’d failed.</p>
<p>Mia visibly wilted when Brian didn’t grin at her when he came into the kitchen. If the others knew about their drive, they didn’t let on.</p>
<p>Dom’s words hadn’t sorted out the mess of fear and anger in Brian’s head. His pulse still throbbed the same beat… <em>stayorgo, stayorgo, stayorgo…</em></p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>---</strong>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>When they pulled into the garage, Brian got out of the car and went over to the Supra straight away, for the first time in days.</p>
<p>He didn’t know what to do still.</p>
<p>For now, that was maybe all right.</p>
<p> </p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>Thank you a thousand times over for all of the support for this story! It is so incredibly appreciated :)</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0009"><h2>9. Chapter Nine</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <hr/>
<p>
  <strong>Chapter Nine</strong>
</p>
<hr/>
<p> </p>
<p>Dom must have said something to the others about not saying anything to him on the racing the Supra for his birthday thing. Nobody said anything else about it, at least, and he didn’t think they’d all just forgotten it collectively.</p>
<p>It seemed like a weird strategy to Brian. Like, shouldn’t they have been talking it up? Making it some big exciting thing that he wanted? It seemed stupid to make them drop it.</p>
<p>The question turned around in his head over and over again as the week kept moving. They still teased him about the car, sure. About how much he loved it, calling it his baby same as usual. It was just the racing it part that had gotten dropped.</p>
<p>He woke up one week after their drive and heard someone puttering around in the kitchen. Mia, maybe, but sometimes it was Dom.</p>
<p>Brian wasn’t sure what he wanted to say. Nothing, maybe. There wasn’t really anything worth saying. There weren’t any amazing updates on his fucked up emotional state. Business as usual up in Brian’s brain.</p>
<p>Still, he slid out of bed and got dressed quickly. He cracked his door open, saw the bathroom was free and darted in before… before…? Before anyone could talk. Before he could chicken out. Before he could see if it was Mia or Dom. Before he could decide which one he wanted to see.</p>
<p>When he came out, it was still mostly dark out. The sun was just rising and, thank fuck, the house was still quiet. Not for much longer.</p>
<p>He padded barefoot out into the hall and stopped at the kitchen doorway.</p>
<p>Dom, making breakfast.</p>
<p>Not unheard of, but not common either. Cooking seemed to be Mia’s zen sometimes. It had taken a few weeks before he’d even seen Dom doing it. Brian wasn’t so great at it. At least not up to Toretto standards. He could cook just enough to keep himself alive without takeout, if it ever came to that.</p>
<p>Silently, he watched Dom measure out flour for pancakes. The other man didn’t react to him, as though he wasn’t being strange standing in a doorway not making a sound.</p>
<p>He was moving before he’d decided he should.</p>
<p>A long time ago, his mother used to make him pancakes on Saturday mornings. Not every week, because sometimes she was too hurt or too high or his father was too angry to let her leave their bed, but most of them.</p>
<p>He set the milk and the eggs on the counter.</p>
<p>Dom didn’t say anything, he just grabbed the jug of milk and poured some in, eyeballing the amount he needed. No recipe, but Brian already knew they’d be tasty as fuck.</p>
<p>His first thought was that Dom was just like that, moving ahead sure of himself without needed any guide to get himself where he wanted to be.</p>
<p>His second thought was about how fucking pathetic he was to be relating their bullshit to pancake making.</p>
<p>
  <em>Let it go, O’Conner, not everything is wrapped up in how much of a mess you’re in. </em>
</p>
<p>He tried. Dom still did the cooking but Brian knew the process well enough to bring him the things he needed, so he did. They moved around each other like this wasn’t anything special. Like they weren’t working together.</p>
<p>The others trickled in and they didn’t say a goddamn word. Brian set down the plate of bacon lined with paper towel to catch the grease alongside the heap of pancakes and he sat down and Dom sat down and they ate and it was fine.</p>
<p>No hitting. No yelling. No hurting. A whole meal made with no pain.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>---</strong>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“You’re gonna finish that too early.” Letty leaned her hip against the Supra and crossed her arms to loom over him. She was only looming, though, because he was bent over with his arms in the engine.</p>
<p>“Too early?” Brian didn’t bother looking up at her.</p>
<p>She kicked him for it, her big boots connecting with his shin just hard enough to throb for a second. “You’ve got months before your birthday. What if you finish before then? You just going to stare at it?”</p>
<p>It was a good question but Brian didn’t really care about the answer. He had bigger shit to figure out. “I’ll sit in it, roll up the windows and turn the music up loud enough to drown you and Vince out.”</p>
<p>He was half braced, in case that got him another kick to the leg. Letty just laughed but he still waited a few extra seconds before he relaxed.</p>
<p>“I guess that’s okay.” She said, as if he’d been asking for permission. “I just wanted to make sure you weren’t going to stare at it for days and days, getting weepy. It’d be depressing, scare away the customers.”</p>
<p>Brian wasn’t sure if that was actual concern in her voice or something else. It didn’t much matter, he was definitely going to finish before his birthday. He had nearly five months to go.</p>
<p>The realization hit him hard. Five whole fucking months and he was wracked with indecision.</p>
<p>There was still so much time to figure it out, time he was apparently going to get to spend in his car. Not driving it, just sitting in it, like he’d said.</p>
<p>Letty sauntered off, apparently content with his answer. Whatever she’d been driving at, she’d gotten it. Or at least that was his guess, he found her pretty impossible to read.</p>
<p>Brian straighted back up, pulling his hands free and reaching for a rag to clean up with.</p>
<p>It was such a habit, not looking at his mark. Even when he was literally looking at his own arms to make sure he’d gotten enough grime off, he barely registered it. This time, he let himself really look at the dark swirls making up the mark that said his soul matched Dom’s.</p>
<p>Brian rubbed his thumb over it. Someday, would it be something he was proud of? Would he look at it and think he’d gotten lucky? That fate or whoever chose this shit had actually gotten it right?</p>
<p>He had five months to figure it out.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>---</strong>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Brian was getting tired of shit having to be messed up before he and Dom went driving. He didn’t want to get keys thrown at his head in the middle of the night and he didn’t want to stumble out of his bedroom half comatose after a nightmare. He wanted, God help him, something a little more normal.</p>
<p>After dinner, before everyone broke away from each other but after most of the room had cleared, Brian grabbed Dom’s keys from the hook by the door and walked back to the kitchen, where Dom was drying the dishes Brian had washed.</p>
<p>And then he jabbed Dom in the back with one of his own keys.</p>
<p>“The fuck are you doing?” Dom said with an annoyance that lacked heat. He didn’t jump, though, the bastard.</p>
<p>“Let’s go to the beach.” Brian said as he twirled the key ring around his finger.</p>
<p>Dom scoffed, “You’re a rude thing, aren’t you? Stab me with a key, make demands, no please no nothing.”</p>
<p>Brian was pretty sure he was being teased but he couldn’t see Dom’s face well enough to guess. “Pretty please, let’s go to the fucking beach?”</p>
<p>“Too early for you to drive.” Dom said evenly without even glancing at the time. The sun hadn’t even finished setting so he didn’t need to.</p>
<p>“You drive there, I drive back.” Brian countered.</p>
<p>Dom twisted around to raise an eyebrow at him, “You wanna sit on the beach for five hours?”</p>
<p>“I think like three and half would cut it,” Brian said, “But sure, five sounds good too.” He definitely wasn’t going to whine if he had to sit longer on the beach.</p>
<p>It took a few seconds of silence and Dom’s shoulders going still to realize that he’d just implied he wanted to sit <em>with Dom</em> for five hours instead of less. He could take it back. He could say something right now and make it clear that he wanted to walk along the waves, lay in the sand and listen to the water. That Dom was the necessary evil in that equation.</p>
<p>Except he wasn’t.</p>
<p>They’d been to the beach before. It was maybe the only place they had ever gone alone before. A few hours in the house or the garage, maybe, but those places were other people’s as much as theirs. The beach, though, that was somewhere only they had gone.</p>
<p>“Go let Jesse talk your ear off for a while,” Dom instructed with an even voice, like none of this was different. “I have to talk over some business stuff with Mia. I’ll come find you when you’re done, it’s okay if you change your mind though.”</p>
<p>“Okay,” Brian answered and he dropped Dom’s keys on the kitchen table, as if he was going to forget the plan while he talked to his sister.</p>
<p>Jesse was in the living room, already hooked on some street racing game that only he was obsessed with. Or at least, only he was obsessed with <em>still</em>. There were enough high scores set by the rest of the team to clue Brian in on how much they’d all played it. Brian was the fresh meat for Jesse to go up against and even <em>he</em> was getting a little sick of it.</p>
<p>“You wanna play, Bri?” Jesse held up the other controller.</p>
<p>“Sure, for a bit.” Brian answered and dropped down onto the couch beside Jesse. “Where’s Leon and Vince?” He asked, although he knew the answer was that they had run as soon as Jesse had made a bee-line for the game.</p>
<p>Jesse jerked his head down, meaning they were in the basement. Smoking, probably. He wasn’t entirely sure why they didn’t load Jesse up with enough weed to chill even his tweaker energy out but no one offered and Jesse didn’t ask. Personal preference, maybe.</p>
<p>The race started up on the screen and Brian went through it, Jesse winning.</p>
<p>The next race, Brian won.</p>
<p>Round three was his too but Jesse came back and won the fourth.</p>
<p>Each game that went by, Brian kept waiting for the regret to jab into his gut. He was waiting for the voice in his head that said Dom was out to ruin him to tell him to get up and go into his room, shutting the door loudly enough that Dom would hear it and know better than to come near him.</p>
<p>He waited and it didn’t come.</p>
<p>Maybe Dom was waiting for it too because he and Jesse were on their eleventh race before he showed up in the doorway during the last lap, leaning against the frame and watching them silently. He was wearing a white hoodie that stretched over his arms and made his skin glow. In his hands, he held his car keys. Still, he didn’t make any move towards the door and he didn’t say anything either way.</p>
<p>“You ready?” Brian asked as the last stretch came up on the screen.</p>
<p>Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Dom nod.</p>
<p>In seconds, the race was over and Jesse won their tie-breaker round. Brian let him crow about it for a couple of minutes because that was only fair. What point was there in winning if you didn’t get to shit-talk the loser for a little bit? Jesse, at least, won a lot more gracefully than Vince did. He lost more gracefully than Vince too, although that wasn’t saying much. Vince lost like a toddler.</p>
<p>He tossed down the controller and stood up, “Keep talking and we’ll see what happens next time.”</p>
<p>Jesse fell sideways down on the couch and started up the game in single-player mode. “Yeah, yeah.”</p>
<p>That was probably as much as decency required him to do, post game. He jerked his head towards the door and left without bothering to see if Dom was following him. For all that Dom could move silently and Brian couldn’t hear him, there was no doubt in his mind that Dom was following.</p>
<p>He pulled a deep breath in once he got outside. It was dark, the sun had finally set, but people were still out and running around. The beach probably wouldn’t even be quiet, there would be families eating dinner or something like that.</p>
<p>Maybe that was better, though?</p>
<p>Whatever, it didn’t matter. Brian needed out of the house.</p>
<p>The drive was quiet. It was maybe something nice about Dom’s personality, that Brian didn’t need to try to fill the air with useless chatter. If they had something to talk about it was one thing. They just didn’t <em>need</em> to.</p>
<p>The second the car was in park, Brian was out the door. He was right, there was still a bit of a crowd on the sand, but it did look to be winding down. They seemed to be the only ones just arriving, being vastly outweighed by the people packing it in.</p>
<p>Still, there were a lot of people.</p>
<p>Dom seemed willing to let Brian take the lead. The beach didn’t seem to really be Dom’s thing, for all that he lived close enough to a pretty nice one. Not like, <em>on</em> the beach of course, but close enough that it could be a daily thing if he was committed enough.</p>
<p>They walked along the edge of the waves for a while, not saying much of anything – but not saying <em>nothing. </em>Some kid tripped and ate sand, they laughed. Some chick was getting way too hot and heavy with a grandpa, they made faces at each other. Some guy reminded Dom of something Vince had once done that was dumb and he told Brian the story. That made Brian remember some ridiculous dare between him and Rome and he told Dom about it.</p>
<p>It was weird, sharing stuff that <em>wasn’t</em> shit from his past. He was pretty sure that Dom thought he was some tragic puppy with nothing but pain behind him. The way Dom laughed while Brian told the story was tinged with relief. Or maybe Brian was reading too much into it.</p>
<p>It didn’t really matter, honestly.</p>
<p>They got quiet for a bit. That was okay, more than okay.</p>
<p>The crowd had thinned out some more. It was getting darker, sun nearly setting completely. He and Dom would stick around a while longer but families were packing it in.</p>
<p>It was her laugh that caught his attention.</p>
<p>Too loud, too happy. That was what his father used to say at least but Brian had always thought she had the best laugh in the world. This woman didn’t sound quite right but it was <em>loud </em>in a way that wasn’t obnoxious. His eyes tracked the sound and found a blonde woman standing a bit further up and his steps faltered for a second.</p>
<p>Dom’s eagle eyes noticed, “Brian?”</p>
<p>He was staring, he knew that. This woman didn’t look identical to her, she was a few years older than his mother had ever gotten to be. It was too dark to see what color her eyes were but the way she smiled…</p>
<p>“Brian? You okay?”</p>
<p>He jerked his head towards her and he felt Dom stiffen beside him more than he felt it.</p>
<p>“She laughs like my mom.” Brian said before he decided he wanted to. “Looks a little like she did.”</p>
<p>Dom’s shoulders didn’t relax. Brian knew he’d wondered, he had to have, but he had so carefully never asked. With his nightmares what they were though… no chance Dom hadn’t wondered before now.</p>
<p>“Pretty,” Dom said finally and he took a step forward.</p>
<p>Brian matched him and they took another one in sync, closer to this woman who had no idea how her laugh was echoing in his ears. Not her laugh, exactly, but it had been her that kicked the echo off so close enough. They leveled up with her and then they past her and Brian had sat though enough English Lit classes to find the symbolism pretty fucking hard to ignore.</p>
<p>“Blonde like you?” Dom fished and Brian couldn’t really blame him for it.</p>
<p>He nodded quietly and Dom seemed willing enough to leave it alone. That last word he’d said before – <em>did –</em> wasn’t something Dom would miss.</p>
<p>They kept walking silently and Brian sort of felt like he’d ruined it, the relaxing vibe gone. Dom was tense and Brian was tense and <em>damn</em>. There really wasn’t anything Brian couldn’t turn into a minefield. He laughed, he couldn’t help it.</p>
<p>“What’s so funny?” Dom asked and at least he didn’t sound thrown off by it. Great, at least Brian was breaking him in okay. It would have been a bummer if Dom was still thrown off by Brian’s fucked up emotional shifts.</p>
<p>“Nothing,” He snickered.</p>
<p>Dom nudged his elbow into Brian’s side, just enough to make it felt but not enough to really hurt. “Then stop cackling, weirdo.”</p>
<p>Brian did but he made sure to let the laughter die down slow just to make a point. They went back to semi-silence for a bit, walking a little further until Brian spied a spot that was empty enough to make it worth sitting down. He pointed to Dom and they walked over to sprawl themselves in the sand.</p>
<p>“Surprised you wanted to come here tonight.” Dom said without looking at Brian. He seemed pretty intent on watching the waves which was a fucking farce because Dom wasn’t all that into the ocean.</p>
<p>He shrugged, “When in doubt, assume I want to go to the beach.”</p>
<p>“Good to know,” Dom laughed a little. The sound of his own laughter seemed to remind him about Brian’s before, “You gonna tell me what was so funny before?”</p>
<p>Brian sighed, “Doesn’t matter.”</p>
<p>“Feels like it does.” Dom countered.</p>
<p>Even though Dom wasn’t looking at him, Brian still rolled his eyes. Hopefully Dom heard it, “Symbolism and shit.”</p>
<p>That got Dom to turn to him, eyebrow raised and a bemused look on his face. “Symbolism and shit.” He repeated.</p>
<p>Brian jerked his head towards the way they came.</p>
<p>“Walking on a beach is symbolic?” Dom sounded skeptical.</p>
<p>“The woman. The one that sounded like my Mom.” Brian said finally. “I was thinking about you and I walking towards her then past her and then I realized it was stupid symbolism and then I realized there’s really nothing I can’t turn into some emotional minefield and I laughed at myself.”</p>
<p>Dom didn’t laugh but then Brian hadn’t thought he would. He treated Brian’s past with a hell of a lot more respect than Brian himself did.</p>
<p>“Tell me something about her.” Dom asked with a voice so hushed Brian wasn’t even sure he had heard it right at first.</p>
<p>Thinking about her hurt. Brian hardly ever let himself. Sometimes he wondered if that was why she was in his dreams so much. Like he had to fight her so hard when he was awake that when he was finally asleep she came to him the only way she had left.</p>
<p>It was even harder coming up with something nice to say to Dom. Something not soaked in blood and pain. Those memories were buried deeper because somehow they hurt worse.</p>
<p>“She liked to sing.” He said finally and he shut his eyes. He would have rather plugged his ears but that wouldn’t do anything to keep the echo of her out.</p>
<p>“Sing what?”</p>
<p>Brian bit his lip and didn’t say anything for a second. Dom stayed silent too. Brian wasn’t sure he had ever really had to talk to someone like him. Someone that listened and waited. It was harder to push that kind of person away. How could Brian shove him away and turn the conversation around if Dom didn’t say anything?</p>
<p>“Quiet things.” He said finally. “Pretty things. I don’t… I don’t even know the names of most of the songs. Every once and while one of them comes on the radio or something and I just… I die a little.”</p>
<p>Dom’s fingers traced along the back of his hand and Brian knew why without even needing to think about it. He turned his hand palm up and Dom wrapped his warm hand around his own.</p>
<p>He was almost braced for the next question but relaxed slowly when he realized it wasn’t coming.</p>
<p>“When my mom sang it was like someone was torturing a cat.” Dom said out of nowhere.</p>
<p>Brian barked out an unexpected laugh. He wasn’t sure what had startled him worse, Dom breaking the silence or his own response to it. “What?”</p>
<p>“I’m being serious.” Dom grinned and though that smile was tinged with sadness, it was still happy. “She sounded like a beached walrus. It was sort of amazing how bad at it she was.”</p>
<p>“That’s real nice,” Brian laughed again.</p>
<p>Dom shook his head, “Sometimes, if one of us had a bad dream she would try to sing a lullaby to help us go back to sleep, except she was really just trying to make us laugh and snap us out of that weird after nightmare headspace. Worked every time.”</p>
<p>This, Brian realized, was maybe sort of the same tactic from Dom. Telling him something funny to snap him out of his own funk. It was still funny though, so he couldn’t really be pissed about it.</p>
<p>He wondered how much of his parents’ tricks Dom had been using to try and counteract Brian’s parents.</p>
<p>“So I should avoid any karaoke bars if you or Mia are around?” Brian asked teasingly.</p>
<p>Dom shook his head, “My dad had a great voice. Mia and I fall somewhere in the middle. He saved your ears.”</p>
<p>Brian hadn’t ever heard his father sing, so he wouldn’t know if he was any good or not. He used to yell at his mother to shut up if he caught her singing. When he was kid, he hadn’t understood how someone could hate the light, sweet sound of her voice. He still didn’t understand.</p>
<p>“Hey,” Dom said as he turned to face Brian better. His free hand reached out and pressed against his cheek, “Don’t go.”</p>
<p>“I didn’t move.” Brian protested.</p>
<p>Dom’s thumb stroked over his cheek and the heat of it felt good. His dark eyes were staring at him so intently and between the look in his eyes and the gentle way Dom touched him it made something in Brian shiver.</p>
<p>“You get lost in your head sometimes. Lost in bad stuff, I think. Don’t.” Dom’s voice was quiet but so, so insistent. “Stay here with me.”</p>
<p>Dom made it sound so easy. <em>Leave the bad stuff behind and stay here in the present with me.</em></p>
<p>Or maybe Dom knew it <em>wasn’t</em> so easy. His eyes went fierce, as though he could fight for Brian here on a beach with no enemy around but the shadows in Brian’s head.</p>
<p>He wanted, he realized slowly, for Dom to win.</p>
<p>Dom’s eyes dipped down to Brian’s lips and then darted back up to meet his gaze again. It seemed like a mistake, something Dom hadn’t meant to do, but they were sitting so close and Dom’s hand was still against his cheek and if they leaned in just a few inches, they would be…</p>
<p>They kissed.</p>
<p>Brian didn’t know who moved first. Both of them maybe. It didn’t really matter.</p>
<p>Dom’s lips pressed hard against his own, as though that was how he was going to win that battle he was always fighting against Brian’s fears. When Brian’s lips parted, Dom took the invitation. His hand slid to the back of Brian’s head so his fingers could tangle in Brian’s curls, tugging just hard enough to set Brian’s heart racing.</p>
<p>When Dom pulled back, Brian tried to lean in closer.</p>
<p>Dom took his fingers from Brian’s hair and brushed a few curls back from his forehead instead, “Don’t freak out.” He said quietly.</p>
<p>They were both out of breath. It didn’t make any sense that such a short kiss could have stolen his breath like that.</p>
<p>“I’m not freaking out.” Brian said.</p>
<p>Dom darted in and kissed his cheek in answer.</p>
<p>They were still holding hands and when Dom leaned back again, he took his other hand away so it was the only point of contact between them.</p>
<p>Why did it suddenly feel like not enough?</p>
<p>He waited for some sort of panic to rush through him. Either because of the kiss or that he’d liked it or that he wanted Dom to do it again. Maybe because of what it could end up meaning or about how he was betraying the plan.</p>
<p>Nothing came really.</p>
<p>If anything, he felt sort of hollow.</p>
<p>“Sitting silently staring into the distance is freaking out, Brian.” Dom squeezed his hand.</p>
<p>“Is it?” Brian asked. It didn’t feel like freaking out.</p>
<p>“This doesn’t have to be some big thing. It doesn’t change anything, unless you want it to.” Dom promised him but that promise rang a little false.</p>
<p>It was obvious how much Dom had liked it.</p>
<p>Damn him, Brian had liked it to.</p>
<p>And that changed <em>everything</em>. How could it not?</p>
<p>Dom stood up and he tugged on Brian’s hand, “Come on. It’s dark enough to go driving now.”</p>
<p>He let himself be back down the beach towards the car. They didn’t say anything else but Brian didn’t think they needed to.</p>
<p>They both knew everything there was to say.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>---</strong>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>When Brian woke up the next morning, his mother’s voice was echoing in his ears and tears were drying on his cheeks.</p>
<p> </p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>Thank you so much for all the kind words for the last chapter! I would love to hear what everyone thinks about this one and their kiss!</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0010"><h2>10. Chapter Ten</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <hr/>
<p>
  <strong>Chapter Ten</strong>
</p>
<hr/>
<p> </p>
<p>It made Brian feel like a stupid middle-schooler to be thinking about one stinking kiss so much. There had barely been any tongue. It had been about a minute and a half long. Nothing major. Nothing worth all this angst.</p>
<p>He wondered if Dom felt the same way.</p>
<p>Not the stupid middle-schooler part. Dominic ‘All in on Soulmarks’ Toretto definitely didn’t think about it like that. The rest of it though… did Dom look at him and remember the taste of his mouth? Did Dom wonder about what it meant and if it was going to happen again and if he even wanted it to?</p>
<p>Scratch that last part too. Dom definitely wanted it to happen again.</p>
<p>Brian knew that entirely because he knew Dom well enough by now. Dom didn’t give any hints of anything else. He didn’t look at Brian any differently. He didn’t act strange. On Dom’s end, it was as though nothing had happened.</p>
<p>And even though he knew that wasn’t true, that Dom didn’t feel that way, it still grated on him.</p>
<p>Why should he be the only idiot thrown for a loop by a tiny little kiss?</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>---</strong>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>A week after the kiss, Brian decided to go to the store instead of the garage.</p>
<p>“I’ll go with Mia.” He said quietly to Leon when he jerked his head towards the door to offer a ride. By now Brian went with whoever was leaving when he wanted to leave. If that meant Leon, fine. If that meant Dom, that was fine too.</p>
<p>It wasn’t something he had really thought through, honestly. It wasn’t like he had come into breakfast thinking about blowing off the garage and Dom along with it.</p>
<p>But when the words came out of his mouth, they felt right.</p>
<p>Leon had given him a sort of wide eyed look before darting out the door. He probably wanted to avoid any drama.</p>
<p>“What did you just say?” Letty asked loud enough to catch everyone’s attention.</p>
<p>Brian rolled his eyes, “I said I’m going with Mia.”</p>
<p>Vince groaned, “Why the fuck are you doing that?”</p>
<p>It was everything he had not to glance over at Dom. Instead, he snatched up a leftover piece of sausage from someone’s plate and flicked it at Vince, “Because I fucking want to. I don’t need your permission, asswipe.”</p>
<p>“Is this cause your baby is done and you’re too sad to look at her?” Letty’s voice was half mocking, half serious.</p>
<p>“No, it’s because I’m tired of listening to Vince whine while that Nissan ignores everything he tries to do to fix it.” Brian threw out there, although he was pretty sure no one but maybe Vince would buy it.</p>
<p>“Hey, I’m going to get it finished today!” Vince said, like he had for the last three days. “And just because…”</p>
<p>“Leave it, V.” Dom cut in, “Don’t make me tell you again.”</p>
<p>
  <em>Brian can go with whoever he wants to and you can’t give him shit for it.</em>
</p>
<p>Old rule.</p>
<p>Vince’s face went sour but he didn’t say anything else. He just stood up and grabbed Letty’s arm, taking her out the door with him even while she punched him in the kidney for dragging her around.</p>
<p>That just left Jesse but he was in the bathroom so Dom was going to have to wait for him.</p>
<p>Which was exactly why Vince had grabbed Letty, the bastard.</p>
<p>The three of them left in the kitchen – Brian, Mia and Dom – didn’t say anything. Brian just went to work drying the dishes that Mia was almost done washing.</p>
<p>Dom hovered.</p>
<p>It was sort of weird, that Dom would stand there kind of awkwardly out of place. Brian didn’t feel bad about it though, finally he got to be the one feeling out of sorts because of <em>his </em>Mark.</p>
<p>The bathroom door opened and before Jesse could even get in the room, Dom called to him, “I’ll meet you at the car.”</p>
<p>For once, Jesse seemed to catch the hint.</p>
<p>Mia turned the sink off and went to dry her hands on a towel. “I’ll be ready in ten, Brian.”</p>
<p>“Okay,” He said without turning around. He heard her leave too until it was just him and Dom standing alone in the kitchen.</p>
<p>Every step Mia took up the stairs, the tension seemed to grow. At least this time he knew it wasn’t just him.</p>
<p>Dom came up behind him, pressing against his back. It was maybe the most full contact they had ever been and the feeling of it, of Dom’s heat and the rock hard muscles he was leaning against Brian’s back, almost made Brian’s breath catch.</p>
<p>“We got something to talk about?” Dom said quietly in his ear.</p>
<p>“No.” Brian said and he meant it.</p>
<p>There was a pause and Brian was waiting to see if Dom tried to call that out as a lie or not.</p>
<p>“I thought you said no one was allowed to give me shit for where I wanted to go?” Brian asked him when he didn’t say anything else.</p>
<p>He knew he had caught Dom with that one. What was the guy going to say?</p>
<p>
  <em>That’s true for everyone but me? </em>
</p>
<p>Dom was always so careful to follow his own rules. To keep his word to Brian. It was maybe shitty to use that against him now but to hell with it. He didn’t care.</p>
<p>“I’m not giving you shit.” Dom said cautiously. “You want to go with Mia, go with Mia. I’m just making sure this isn’t some warning sign of one of your funks.”</p>
<p>Brian huffed out a laugh, “<em>My funks</em>, nice.”</p>
<p>“You know what I mean.” Dom said and he finally leaned back a little, giving Brian back about an inch of personal space. Not enough but in some ways it was too much. His skin felt cold were Dom had been seconds before and Brian knew without a doubt that he <em>needed </em>some time away from the garage. Like, it was vital.</p>
<p>“I want to go with Mia. No funks.” Brian repeated.</p>
<p>
  <em>I want to kiss you again and I want you to seem like you want to kiss me again. </em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>I don’t want to kiss you ever again and seeing you makes it harder to believe that. </em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>I need space from you because this is getting too easy. </em>
</p>
<p>Dom stared at him for another few seconds and Brian realized he had said all of that without even looking at Dom. That was definitely for the better but he was pretty sure that Dom didn’t agree.</p>
<p>“I’ll see you tonight.” Dom said finally.</p>
<p>“Have fun listening to Vince bitch at that car all day.” Brian offered back.</p>
<p>Dom let out of huff of breath that was somewhere between a laugh and a groan. He walked away and Brian felt that little bit of tension drain out.</p>
<p>This was a good idea.</p>
<p>This wasn’t a big deal.</p>
<p>Going with Mia <em>wasn’t</em> him freaking out.</p>
<p>Everything was fine.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>---</strong>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Okay seriously.” Mia erupted by about hour two. “Why are you here?”</p>
<p>Brian sighed but honestly, he had to give her credit for holding on for so long. “Why does this need to be a big thing?” He asked. The question was directed to the straws he was refilling but he meant it for a general global audience.</p>
<p>“You haven’t come with me in months, Brian.” Mia reminded him and it was funny to hear how long it had been.</p>
<p>He hadn’t missed it.</p>
<p>“Maybe I was getting nostalgic.” Brian tried to say that seriously but it came out with a laugh. He couldn’t even pretend.</p>
<p>Mia snorted, “Oh yeah, you totally missed sweeping the floor and restocking the cooler. I completely understand.”</p>
<p>“Maybe I missed hanging out with you?” Brian offered a little more sincerely. He and Mia had had their ups and downs but she was still a pretty cool person.</p>
<p>That at least got her to lighten up a little. She reached out for him and patted his cheek, “That was sweet but also a total lie. You see me every day. We hang out in the kitchen. We bitch about how gross Letty’s apartment must be together all the time.”</p>
<p>“I think I’m getting to the point where I kind of want to go?” Brian admitted. He never thought the day would come but the curiosity was getting to him.</p>
<p>Mia made a disgusted face, “If you do, you have to hose off outside before you can come back in the house. I’m not kidding.”</p>
<p>“Aren’t you like, morbidly curious about it?” How could she <em>not</em> be?</p>
<p>Mia looked vaguely sick, “I mean… maybe? A little? I guess I would rather you go, take pictures and then Dom can throw you into the ocean after to decontaminate.”</p>
<p>“Gee thanks,” Brian laughed, “Make me the sacrificial lamb.”</p>
<p>“You’re the one that said you kind of wanted to go!” Mia made sure to point out.</p>
<p>“Fatal flaw to your plan,” Brian said as he closed up the box of straws, counter restock finally complete, “Is that Dom is nearly as big a neat freak as you. I doubt he’s going to want to touch me to throw me into the ocean.”</p>
<p>“Dom is not <em>nearly</em> big enough a neat freak to not want to touch you, no matter how dirty you get. I bet he would hug you even if you rolled around on the floor of Letty’s place.” Mia laughed when she said it and he appreciated that she didn’t tiptoe around the comment.</p>
<p>Once she would have.</p>
<p>Once it would have been necessary, because he would have blown up at her for saying it.</p>
<p>Now it was just sort of the truth and he wasn’t nearly afraid of Dom enough or angry about being handed off to his Mark enough to care that she let it be said aloud.</p>
<p>If anything, it would be the tiptoeing that would be annoying now.</p>
<p>“<em>I</em> wouldn’t want to hug me if I rolled around on her floor.” Brian said seriously.</p>
<p>The door opened and Brian glanced back to see three nurses who worked down the street at some specialist’s office come in laughing. They were regulars from what he remembered and Brian took his box of straws towards the back and let Mia take their orders.</p>
<p>The three never stayed long, they usually went to sit somewhere outside while they ate, and about ten minutes later Brian wandered back out.</p>
<p>Mia didn’t say anything for a few minutes. He wasn’t sure if that meant the conversation from before was done or not, but he was fine either way. Joking with Mia was nice. Both because she had a pretty wicked sense of humor when she got going and because they had gotten to a place where joking could actually happen.</p>
<p>If she felt the same way… maybe she wouldn’t mind the question that had been sort of burning inside of him for a while now.</p>
<p>“Hey, Mia?”</p>
<p>She hummed a little to show she was listening while she cleaned up whatever she had used to make the nurses’ sandwiches.</p>
<p>“Can I ask you something?”</p>
<p>The politeness maybe tipped her off that it wasn’t going to be a question about her favorite pizza toppings or something lame like that. She looked up at him, a little confused but mostly her expression was pretty open. “Sure, Brian.”</p>
<p>“What about yours?” He slid into one of the stools in front of her.</p>
<p>“My what?” Mia asked before the question seemed to catch up with her. “Oh,” She said, “My Mark?”</p>
<p>He nodded, waiting to see if being asked pissed her off. Some people got touchy about that.</p>
<p>Mia’s hand went to her hip and he knew that was where her Mark was, even if he had never seen it. Might never see it, honestly. Some people got touchy about <em>that</em> too.</p>
<p>“It’s actually a word.” Mia revealed. Just about three quarters of the time, Marks were some kind of image. Words weren’t rare but they weren’t hella common either.</p>
<p>Brian smiled as gently as he could. He knew how the Torettos felt about their Marks and he didn’t want her to think he was like heckling her or something. If he was going to ask, he was gonna be nice about it.</p>
<p>“I haven’t met them, obviously. I kind of don’t want to for a while, if that makes sense? Like I want to be older and established and have lots to bring to the table.” Mia said with a little flush to her cheeks.</p>
<p>That was <em>very</em> Toretto, from what he knew. They weren’t happy unless they were taking care of someone.</p>
<p>“Well, I’m pretty sure the universe owes you guys better luck the second time around so I’m sure finding your Mark will be at the perfect time, right when you want it to be.” Brian said sincerely.</p>
<p>Mia rolled her eyes, “And <em>I’m</em> pretty sure that Dom thinks he found you at absolutely the right time so he probably used up all the good luck.”</p>
<p>Brian couldn’t help but raise a skeptical eyebrow. “He got a call from a prison. I don’t think that’s what dreams are made of, Mia.”</p>
<p>She looked like he was so stupid she pitied him, which wasn’t even close to the first time he had seen that expression on her face directed his way, “He found you <em>when you needed him</em>. Even better, he found you in a way that meant he got custody of you, instead of him finding you before you went to juvie when he would have had to play your father’s game to protect you. <em>That </em>would have sucked. He would have done it, of course, but it would have sucked.”</p>
<p>They had tried to tell him about it before, the call that Dom got and his reaction to it, but Brian had either brushed them off or told them to shut their fucking mouths, depending on his mood at the time and how desperately he didn’t want to hear it.</p>
<p>He was maybe ready.</p>
<p>Never let it be said that Mia Toretto was bad at reading people. Or maybe she was so used to him saying no that she knew when the shift happened.</p>
<p>And she was always, <em>always</em> ready to try and build Dom up in Brian’s eyes.</p>
<p>“I answered the phone and I actually almost hung up on them.” Mia laughed and it felt a little forced, like she was trying to ease him into the story in case he bolted but what she said was interesting enough that he wasn’t about to.</p>
<p>“Why?”</p>
<p>She shrugged, “Why would I think it was going to be about his Mark? I figured they were going to hassle him,” About the prison sentence that no one <em>ever</em> mentioned, “Or like they wanted to question him or something.” Mia flushed a little, “The woman on the phone was literally so done arguing with me. She finally said that it was about his Mark and I nearly passed out. I had been about two seconds from hanging up.”</p>
<p>The idea that Mia had held his fate in her hands for about five minutes and had nearly pressed a little button on a phone that would have sent him on a whole other path was sort of funny. It was the little moments in life that were apparently the biggest.</p>
<p>“I’d still be in juvie. Dom and I would have never met and your tuna costs would be way, way down.” Brian teased her a little.</p>
<p>Something flickered across Mia’s face and he could see she was really haunted by what she had nearly inadvertently done to them.</p>
<p>“Hey,” He reached out and tapped the back of her hand, “It’s fine. Even if you had hung up, it would have been fine.”</p>
<p>“Oh yeah,” Mia laughed a little tremulously, “You would have been great. Dumped on your ass out of juvie after you turned eighteen with no one by your side. That would have been awesome, I’m sure.”</p>
<p>It was interesting that her upset, or at least the first one she mentioned, was for <em>him</em> – not for Dom, missing out on finding his Mark.</p>
<p>“I’d have figured it out.” Brian promised with a grin.</p>
<p>Mia looked supremely skeptical but he couldn’t blame her.</p>
<p>“So, after she said that and then said it twice more because I was floored, I asked if she was sure, obviously. I got the driest ‘<em>Do you think we make these kinds of calls if we aren’t sure?’</em> in the world.” Mia continued. “By now the team was on their way out to go to the garage and I flew after Dom. I think I freaked him out, screaming his name across the house like that. I said that there was someone on the phone from the correctional office and everyone thought the same as me. I blurted it out, that they were calling about you.”</p>
<p>The way Mia was setting the scene almost had to make Brian laugh. Except, each time a laugh built while he picture it, he imagine Dom’s face and any humor drained right out of him. He cleared his throat, “And how many times did <em>you</em> need to repeat it for him while that lady on the phone had to listen?” He tried to joke.</p>
<p>“Zero.” Mia said quietly. “I said it once and he grabbed the phone before all the words were even out of my mouth. He said to her ‘<em>What do you need from me?’</em> and that was it, pretty much. He was ready to do whatever they wanted before I had even finished telling him they were calling about his Mark.”</p>
<p>Brian knew she wasn’t exaggerating in the slightest.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>---</strong>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>He made damned sure he didn’t ask about when he said he wouldn’t meet Dom.</p>
<p>That was a story he didn’t need to be told.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>---</strong>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>When Brian picked Mia the next day, everyone seemed to take in stride. He was pretty sure Dom had coached them but whatever.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>---</strong>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>When Brian picked Mia the day after that, Vince had stared at Letty’s full glass of orange juice so hard Brian had decided to peace out to the porch just in case.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>---</strong>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>By the end of his first week back at the store, Brian felt steadier.</p>
<p>He knew it mostly because he was thinking more about how boring the place was over how much he wanted to kiss Dom again. If that wasn’t an indication that his plan for regaining sanity was a success then he didn’t know what was.</p>
<p>It was eight in the friggin’ morning and he was on his knees unloading cans onto the bottom shelf two rows back, seriously reconsidering all the life choices that had led him to this moment.</p>
<p>He could be at the garage.</p>
<p>He could be arms deep in an engine, getting worthwhile shit done.</p>
<p>And that was when he knew that next week he could actually go and be a rational human being.</p>
<p>The revelation was totally welcome.</p>
<p>While he loaded each can on the shelf, he fantasized about calling the garage and asking for a pick-up. Dom would totally come so that wasn’t a problem but the heckling he’d get for it made calling maybe not worth it. Besides, what if he needed another turn in the mind-numbing store to…</p>
<p>“<em>Hands up where I can see them!”</em></p>
<p>Brian froze.</p>
<p> </p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>;)</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0011"><h2>11. Chapter Eleven</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <hr/>
<p>
  <strong>Chapter Eleven </strong>
</p>
<hr/>
<p> </p>
<p>“<em>Hands up where I can see them!”</em></p>
<p>Brian froze.</p>
<p>He heard Mia’s sharp intake of breath in the otherwise silent store. The door had opened, he’d heard it, but he wasn’t paying attention. Was there just one guy? Two?</p>
<p>Did he have a gun?</p>
<p>“Listen, sweetheart, you’re going to do exactly what I want, okay?”</p>
<p>The man’s voice was so goddamned condescending and sleazy Brian grit his teeth hearing someone talk to Mia like that.</p>
<p>Worse, he didn’t sound young and stupid or afraid. He sounded cool and calm, like this was no big deal to him. The kind of guy who had tried to be a cop or some other person with authority before getting thrown out because the higher ups realized what a potential shit show he would most likely become for them if given enough time and power.</p>
<p>As silently as he could, Brian crawled to the edge of the row he was in, hoping that the guy was facing Mia and wouldn’t see someone poking their head out behind him.</p>
<p>Two guys.</p>
<p>Fuck.</p>
<p>And yep, great, a gun pointed straight at Mia.</p>
<p>“You want money, take it and go.” Mia said and her voice wasn’t even wavering. Toretto steel.</p>
<p>“I wanted money, but you’re so pretty I might want a little more too.” The asshole said and Brian knew without a doubt that hiding back here and letting the guy take the fifty bucks in the register and going on his merry way wasn’t an option.</p>
<p>“Dude, we don’t have time…” The other guy said and <em>he</em> at least sounded like he’d be easy to take down.</p>
<p>“She don’t even really open for another hour. No regulars comin’ in.” Sleazy drawled back lazily. His voice went to some ugly croon to say to Mia, “Not real smart, are you? Lock the doors if you’re all by yourself.”</p>
<p>Were these shelves bolted into the ground? Could he sneak into the first row and knock one down on them? Mia was behind counter but… fuck, no, that wouldn’t work. They weren’t tall enough or heavy enough to take either guy out and the counter would keep them from falling close enough to do any damage at all.</p>
<p>
  <em>Think… think…</em>
</p>
<p>He needed a weapon or something. A bat would be awesome. All the aisles had were the basic kinds of foods if someone was desperate or on a road trip.</p>
<p>The umbrella stand caught his eye.</p>
<p>If he hit the guy with the wooden handle… would that be enough? If he did it hard enough and got a good blow to the temple, he might knock one of them out. And if he tried to swing one towards the other he <em>might </em>buy himself a second to get the gun. He wished he could hit the guy with the gun straight off, but the other guy was closer and there was no way to stealth himself into the right position.</p>
<p>Fuck, this was an awful plan.</p>
<p>And it was the only one he had.</p>
<p>Sleazy said something else to Mia but Brian’s head was racing too hard to really listen. He heard the ding of the register open and he was hoping that they would be so mesmerized by their payout that they wouldn’t notice the rando kid creeping to the umbrella stand and lifting the biggest one up and out as quietly as possible.</p>
<p>Brian crept behind them. Thankfully, Mia was grabbing money and she couldn’t see him. If she could, he’d be getting some major stink eye for even thinking this plan was going to work.</p>
<p>The umbrella went up, he wound it a second and as he swung as hard as he possibly could towards the smaller dude’s temple, he sent up a little prayer to whatever was out there that <em>didn’t</em> hate him that this was going to work.</p>
<p>The cracking sound of wood on skull was pretty satisfying.</p>
<p>“Mia duck!” Brian yelled as the first dude toppled into the one with the gun.</p>
<p>
  <em>Yes!</em>
</p>
<p>Brian saw Mia grab the phone and duck under the counter. Hopefully she was calling the police and not Dom. Not that Dom wouldn’t get there fast and put the hurt on these guys but Brian was also not really looking to add murder to Dom’s rap sheet.</p>
<p>And that was absolutely what would happen if Dom got there first. These guys would be <em>toast</em>.</p>
<p>He didn’t have time to worry about it though. He swung the umbrella again but this time the gun guy (who had a good grip on the thing it seemed – <em>fuck</em>) was recovering. Before he got to aim at Brian, he bashed his hand with the umbrella and the gun went flying towards the soda cases.</p>
<p>“Little shit!” Sleazy grunted as he grabbed the umbrella with his other hand and wrenched it out of Brian’s grip before he sent it sailing across the store out of either of their reach.</p>
<p>That meant the only weapon left to either of them was that gun.</p>
<p>They both realized it at the same second and when Sleazy went lunging for it, Brian tackled him and got an elbow in the eye for his trouble.</p>
<p>“Fuck,” Brian said, his head reflexively tucking in to keep his eyes from getting jabbed any worse. He threw all his weight into knocking the guy down and they both slammed against the linoleum hard enough to make his body throb.</p>
<p>There wasn’t any time to reorient himself or wait until his eye stopped watering. Brian scrambled forward but the guy wasn’t waiting either. He grabbed Brian’s leg to yank him back and in the same motion sent his knee for a direct hit to his kidney.</p>
<p>That hurt. That hurt a <em>lot</em>.</p>
<p>But Brian knew how to take a hit. He knew how to keep going even when the pain made his vision white out.</p>
<p><em>Keep moving</em>.</p>
<p>“Stop!” Mia screamed, “The police are coming, get out of here while you can! Leave him alone!”</p>
<p>If Sleazy heard her, he didn’t let on.</p>
<p>Brian flipped himself onto his back, taking the guy half on top of him with him. That put them both a few more feet from the gun, out of reaching range, but it also put Brian underneath this dude which was <em>not</em> good.</p>
<p>If there wasn’t a gun involved, if Mia wasn’t there, Brian wouldn’t have done something so stupid.</p>
<p>But there was. And she was. So he was stuck trying to use his legs and braced arms to keep this guy from being able to reach him.</p>
<p>Didn’t really work.</p>
<p>Instead of bothering trying to reach his face well enough to punch, Sleazy grabbed his arms and used his locked elbow position against him, jerking him up and slamming him back down on the ground.</p>
<p>This guy wasn’t a stranger to a fight.</p>
<p>The back of Brian’s head slammed so hard against the ground that he immediately saw stars burst across his vision.</p>
<p>And then the guy did it again.</p>
<p>The second blow hurt worse than the first. It yanked his ability to plan or defend right out of his head. His arms went limp and the guy took the opportunity to do a one-two punch, alternating hands to get both sides of his head.</p>
<p>Mia screamed again.</p>
<p>The guy’s weight went sideways and something metal clanged against the ground in a way that echoed in Brian’s woozy head.</p>
<p>Her screaming jolted him a little. <em>Focus, you idiot, focus or he’ll kill you both.</em></p>
<p>Brian got his leg curled up and kneed the guy in the chest as hard as he could. Sleazy gasped in a breathless kind of way that Brian hoped meant that he’d knocked the air out of him.</p>
<p>With the guy off balance, Brian bucked up, hoping to knock him off him. He made damn sure to force him down on his side that was further from the gun, taking him a few more feet from his goal.</p>
<p>Sirens wailed in the distance.</p>
<p><em>Thank fuck</em>. His head was swimming and his whole body felt too heavy.</p>
<p>That didn’t mean he lacked the strength to kick Sleazy again though.</p>
<p>He was aiming for the neck but got his shoulder instead when Sleazy rolled into it.</p>
<p>When Brian managed to get himself vaguely upright, the whole room went in a lazy circle around him and the pressure in his skull tripled. Each throb felt like they were going to explode his whole brain.</p>
<p>“Brian, watch out!”</p>
<p>The fist came out of nowhere, sideswiping his head and sending him back down into a sprawl on the ground.</p>
<p>The room went dark.</p>
<p>Hands flipped him over and a red, sweaty faced loomed over him.</p>
<p>“Piece of shit.”</p>
<p>His dad’s voice echoed. “<em>Little piece of shit.” </em></p>
<p>Another metal clang.</p>
<p>A groan.</p>
<p>A body hit the floor.</p>
<p>Brian scrambled back. <em>Don’t let him see. Don’t let him find you. Stay hidden. </em></p>
<p>The doors burst open and then people started shouting. Brian sucked in air as quickly as he could without making a sound. He was hiding under the table and if he kept real still, no one would see him, would they?</p>
<p>
  <em>There’s no table in the store. You’re under the counter. </em>
</p>
<p>Brian blinked and realized there was blood in his eyes. When he blinked a few more times, the red sheen only got worse.</p>
<p><em>Police lights</em>.</p>
<p>Someone was shouting.</p>
<p>Maybe no blood then, except there was because he could smell it. The thick, metallic smell made his stomach turn.</p>
<p>“What’s his name?”</p>
<p>“Brian O’Conner. He’s my brother’s Mark.”</p>
<p>“How old?”</p>
<p>“Seventeen.”</p>
<p>“We need paramedics in here!”</p>
<p>The shout made Brian wince.</p>
<p>Someone knelt down in front of him, “Brian? You with us, kid?”</p>
<p>
  <em>Don’t speak. Don’t make a sound. Don’t let him see you.</em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>Where are you, you little shit?</em>
</p>
<p>“Brian?”</p>
<p>
  <em>Mom?</em>
</p>
<p>“Brian, Dom is coming okay? Let them help you. It’s over, I promise.”</p>
<p>Another woman came close, older than his mom. She stared at him with a smile and he knew he couldn’t trust her. Social workers. Maybe she cared, maybe she didn’t. Didn’t matter. Wasn’t going to help anyway. Not really.</p>
<p>“Hi, Brian. My name is Christie.”</p>
<p><em>Go away</em>.</p>
<p>His head throbbed in time with his pulse. He wrapped his hand around the metal of the stool and blinked at her. Where had she come from? Who the hell was she?</p>
<p>“Can I come closer, Brian? I just want to help, okay?”</p>
<p>“Brian, let her help.”</p>
<p>
  <em>Shh, Mia, he’ll see you too. He’ll hurt you like he hurt her.</em>
</p>
<p>A man knelt down beside the woman. Dark skin, big glowing white smile like Rome’s. He was older, though. “Brian, we’re paramedics. Can you come out from between those stools?”</p>
<p>Glass crunched somewhere, gurney wheels rolling over something broken. He didn’t look. <em>Couldn’t</em> look. These people were staring at him, he couldn’t afford to take his eyes from them.</p>
<p>Tires squealed.</p>
<p>“Buddy, we’re not going to hurt you.” Not Rome said, “I bet your head hurts real bad. Can you let us close enough to see what we can do to fix it?”</p>
<p>“Brian!” A voice like thunder roared. “Mia!”</p>
<p>“Dom!” His mother called back and she sobbed. Brian flinched. He hated when she cried.</p>
<p>“Jesus, Mia, are you okay?”</p>
<p>“I’m fine. Brian knocked one of them out with an umbrella and then he and the gunman fought each other. Brian knocked the gun out of his hands but then they were fighting for it. He literally slammed Brian’s head against the floor and punched him again and again. He’s got himself wedged between the stools under the counter and he won’t let the paramedics close. I think he’s really out of it, Dom.”</p>
<p>More tires. Doors slammed. More voices called for Mia. And him. They even sounded scared.</p>
<p>“V, Letty, stay with Mia.”</p>
<p>Work boots and grease stained jeans came into his view, right next to the two social workers who had gone quiet. Not Rome and the woman.</p>
<p>“Cops said his Mark was coming. That you?” Not Rome asked.</p>
<p>“I am.” The man said and when he crouched down, Brian finally put the thunderous voice with the face.</p>
<p><em>Dom</em>.</p>
<p>
  <em>Someday you’re going to trust that I’ll never hurt you. Someday you’ll know that like you know your own name, you have my word.</em>
</p>
<p>Dom ducked his head down a little like he was trying to see Brian better. “Brian, you with me?”</p>
<p>A pause.</p>
<p>Some part of him wanted to say yes. The other part told him to stay quiet. Was he with Dom? Wasn’t that what he had been spending months trying to figure out?</p>
<p>“From what your sister explained, he took some serious knocks to his head. He seems to be bleeding from two separate head wounds, worse in the back. No blood from the eye that’s swelling, which means that’s at least three different blows. He’s seriously disoriented. If there’s something else wrong, he won’t let us see. Do you think you can get him to come out?” Not Rome explained.</p>
<p>Dom’s fist clenched.</p>
<p>“He’s… he’s kinda skittish anyway.” Dom said slowly, like the words hurt. “We haven’t been together long. I don’t know if he’ll…”</p>
<p>The woman smiled at them both, “Try.”</p>
<p>They inched back and Brian felt like he could breathe a little better.</p>
<p>Dom came closer, still crouched low so they were on the same level, “Hey Brian,” His hand reached out slowly and reached for Brian’s knee that he had drawn up.</p>
<p>He flinched, even though he didn’t really mean to. Flinching meant moving. Moving meant he could be found. Except Dom had already found him. Did he still need to hide?</p>
<p>Everything was such a mess in his head. Nothing was making sense but when he tried to think anything through, the pain got worse.</p>
<p>Dom’s hand went slower when he flinched. “We’re okay, Brian. You won, that guy is gone.”</p>
<p>“Who?” Brian whispered, as quiet as he could.</p>
<p>Something flickered on Dom’s face but Brian didn’t understand it. His hand pressed against Brian’s knee, “Doesn’t matter anymore. You’re safe, I promise.”</p>
<p>“Shh,” If he was too loud, he would find them.</p>
<p>“Your head hurt?” Dom asked, as though <em>that</em> was why Brian wanted him to be quiet. As if his voice were the too loud thing in the room.</p>
<p>Brian didn’t dare nod.</p>
<p>Dom shifted a little closer and pitched his voice lower, “I’m here, Brian, no one is gonna touch you. I promise, okay?”</p>
<p>The death grip that Brian had on one of the stools eased just a little, his fingers aching as blood rushed back into the locked joints.</p>
<p>“It’s over, baby.” Dom’s voice was so soft and steady, “It’s finished. You’re safe.”</p>
<p>
  <em>It’s okay, baby, we’re okay. Daddy’s gone. Come here, come to me. </em>
</p>
<p>Brian shut his eyes against the sting of tears.</p>
<p>Dom’s voice stayed steady but got closer, “Gonna get you fixed up, okay? You’re going to be fine.”</p>
<p>When Brian opened his eyes, Dom was right in front of him. Instead of feeling caged in though, he just felt safer. No one was getting past someone like Dom. No one was going to touch him if Dom didn’t let them close. He blinked again, tired straight down to his bones.</p>
<p>He felt something gently press to one of the sore spots on his head and Brian hissed when it made contact. His eyes opened but it was hard to focus on Dom.</p>
<p>“Sorry,” Dom said quickly, “I’m sorry. We have to stop the bleeding. I’m sorry it hurts.”</p>
<p>“Your hands are dirty, so I want you to reach your free hand back here so we can get a glove on it, okay?” A woman’s voice said softly. She wasn’t talking to him, he didn’t think. “And then I want you to feel the wound in the back, tell us what we’re working with.”</p>
<p>Dom didn’t respond but he did hold his hand out behind his back. “We’re okay, Brian.”</p>
<p>They didn’t <em>feel</em> okay. Nothing felt okay.</p>
<p>When Dom reached his other hand for Brian’s face, he flinched again. Even though he knew there weren’t any punches coming from Dom, even though he knew Dom would rather light his hand on fire than use it to hurt him, even though it hadn’t been Dom who put the hurt on him this time.</p>
<p>Brian’s flinch made Dom freeze and Brian could see it. See the hurt flash in Dom’s dark eyes.</p>
<p>Pain was all he was good for. Taking it and giving it.</p>
<p>“I’m not going to hurt you.” Dom promised again. For the second time or the hundredth time.</p>
<p>“I know.” Brian whispered and meant it.</p>
<p>Dom’s eyes almost widened.</p>
<p>Brian shut his eyes again.</p>
<p>Without a word, he reached his other hand for the back of Brian’s head and gently felt around.</p>
<p>Brian winced, the throbbing cranking up until it was sharp and stinging.</p>
<p>“Pretty good gash,” Dom said, “Gonna need stitches.”</p>
<p>“Can you feel bone?”</p>
<p>It was Dom who flinched then. “No.”</p>
<p>“Great,” The woman said and she even sounded like she meant it. “Give me that hand back and I’m going to pass you a penlight. I need you to check how his pupils are responding.”</p>
<p>“Don’t need it,” Dom said, “They’re already uneven.”</p>
<p>“Concussion,” Not Rome decided. He didn’t sound as happy as her.</p>
<p>“Brian, open your eyes,” Dom tiled his head up more, “Brian, please.”</p>
<p>Sleep tugged at the edges of his brain, demanding he give in. When he opened his eyes for Dom again, the image in front of him swam. “Dom…”</p>
<p>“Stay awake, baby.”</p>
<p>His eyes shut.</p>
<p>
  <em>“Brian, wake up.” </em>
</p>
<p>The fear in Dom’s voice was the last thing that he registered before he let go and went under.</p>
<p> </p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>Thank you so much for all of the comments, kudos and bookmarks, I really appreciate it!!! </p>
<p>Please let me know what you think of the chapter!</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0012"><h2>12. Chapter Twelve</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <hr/>
<p>
  <strong>Chapter Twelve </strong>
</p>
<hr/>
<p> </p>
<p>Faces swam in front of his eyes, people he didn’t know, people who kept touching him and asking questions. Lights that were too bright. Voices that shouted.</p>
<p>And through all of it, Dom.</p>
<p>Standing guard beside him. Holding his hand. Grounding him in a world that didn’t make any sense anymore.</p>
<p>“We’re okay,” He kept promising.</p>
<p>And Brian believed him.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>---</strong>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p><em>Stop</em>…</p>
<p>“Brian, can you open your eyes for us?”</p>
<p><em>Don’t touch me</em>.</p>
<p>Something touched the side of his head and he flinched away. The movement <em>hurt</em>, his head throbbed and nothing made sense and who were these people and…</p>
<p>“Brian, you’re all right, just calm down.”</p>
<p>He pried his eyes open and groaned when the light seared them. He clenched them shut again and tried to curl up onto his side. The throbbing ramped up. His back hurt but getting his aching head away from these reaching hands was more important.</p>
<p>Hands pressed against his bare shoulders, forcing him back down. He realized he wasn’t wearing a shirt.</p>
<p>He was cold.</p>
<p>“Lemme go.” He slurred at them.</p>
<p>No one let him go.</p>
<p>Someone was saying something but the throbbing in his head drowned most of it out. He bucked himself up, determined to fight.</p>
<p>
  <em>“…concussed… can’t – a sedative.” </em>
</p>
<p>“Stay’way from me.”</p>
<p>“<em>… Mark? Go and…” </em></p>
<p>All the words mashed together until they were nothing.</p>
<p>His eyes opened again and there were only people in masks staring down at him like he was a bug. One reached for him and he threw his arm out, catching whoever it was with his fist. The person made an <em>oof</em> sort of noise and stepped away.</p>
<p>“Brian.”</p>
<p>The voice didn’t register, not until there was a face to go with it. Dom came into his field of vision and blocked out the intense lights above him. His eyes still ached but it wasn’t the intense pain from before.</p>
<p>“Brian, you’re-”</p>
<p>He didn’t hear what came after. Didn’t hear what he was. All he knew was that a warm hand carefully laid on his arm and <em>this</em> touch was different than the rest.</p>
<p>In one rush of air, he went boneless and slumped down onto the bed he had been trying to get off of.</p>
<p>“That’s it, everything… no one is going… not while I’m- ”</p>
<p>He was so tired.</p>
<p>He was asleep before he decided to let go.</p>
<p>
  
</p>
<p>
  <strong>---</strong>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>He was going to kill this chick that kept poking him awake.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>---</strong>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>By the time Brian felt like he could string a coherent thought together, the sun had gone down and risen again. He knew because he never got a chance to sleep long enough to get confused about it.</p>
<p>He knew why – this was <em>not</em> his first concussion. He could deal with the pain but the confusion, man, that was what sucked. The disorientation. The feeling like he couldn’t make any sense of what was going on around him. That eased off first, lucky for him. It always did. The concussion wasn’t the thing that knocked his ability to follow the plot sideways, it was the hit itself.</p>
<p>This was the first concussion he had ever gotten that didn’t come from his father but somehow the man’s voice was still echoing in his head as if he had last heard it yesterday and not a year ago.</p>
<p><em>That</em> sucked the worst.</p>
<p>He turned his head and saw Dom camped out beside him, in the same chair that he had been in for hours. Nurses changed. The questions were different. The sun rose and set.</p>
<p>And Dom stayed.</p>
<p>Never before had he had a center-point to that chaos before. <em>Never</em>. Not his mother, not Rome. No one, nothing.</p>
<p>But <em>Dom had stayed</em>.</p>
<p>
  <em>“I’m not going to hurt you.” </em>
</p>
<p>He could admit it now, finally. All these months at Dom’s side, he could finally say it and mean it.</p>
<p>Dom wasn’t going to hurt him. Not really. Not on purpose.</p>
<p>If there was a monster in this bond, it was going to be Brian. Was it enough that he didn’t want it to be him? Was it enough to promise that he would check himself every day?</p>
<p>He didn’t know. Pure and simple, he didn’t fucking know.</p>
<p>Would <em>Dom</em> keep him in check? Would Dom keep him from turning on him?</p>
<p>Maybe. Probably.</p>
<p>Was it enough?</p>
<p>He didn’t know. He maybe wouldn’t ever know.</p>
<p>Thinking about it made his head ache even though it felt like he’d gotten some nice drugs for the pain. He wasn’t meant to be focusing hard. No massive existential crises were allowed on concussion protocol. He could give up TV but sorry doc, he couldn’t give up the internal freakouts.</p>
<p>A nurse came through the door and smiled wide when she saw him awake. “Hello,” She said, “This is a nice surprise.”</p>
<p>“Hi,” Brian was pretty sure he remembered her. Apparently the shifts had swung back around, “If I told you I hated you, then I’m sorry.”</p>
<p>She laughed quietly but it wasn’t fake. He appreciated that. “You mumbled a death threat at me once, but I forgive you.”</p>
<p>“Thanks Jessika,” Her name tag was probably as much as his battered brain was going to let him read for quite a while, but he figured if he was going to put that focus on reading something, he might as well say the name of the person who dealt with him threatening death on her with grace.</p>
<p>He didn’t fuss when she went through her usual questions, although she was pretty half hearted about it, while she checked the wound on the back of his head. Apparently he was already scoring high enough on the coherency scale that he got off with some boring softballs.</p>
<p>“How soon can I go?” Brian asked. He was already itching for it.</p>
<p>“Aren’t you even going to ask?” Jessika leaned back and looked at him with a look that said she wasn’t surprised, “About your injuries, I mean.”</p>
<p>He shrugged, “Head wound. I’ve got stitches back there, don’t I?”</p>
<p>“Six,” She confirmed. “Just a few butterfly bandages on the cut in the front. Don’t worry, it shouldn’t scar.”</p>
<p>Not high on his priorities but he’d take it, “So six stitches and a concussion. Anything else?”</p>
<p>“A bruised kidney but you’ve already stopped urinating blood.” Jessika said it kind of apologetically and when Brian shifted his hips he felt it – yep, that wasn’t his first rodeo either.</p>
<p>“Great,” Brian said, “Anything else?”</p>
<p>“General cuts and bruises. You’re going to be really sore for a while.”</p>
<p>That he had already guessed, “So what does all that mean for staying here?”</p>
<p>“The doctor would probably be willing to discharge you this afternoon, if you eat all right and don’t experience any dizziness or confusion again.” Jessika seemed pretty confident with this answer and he trusted her.</p>
<p>It seemed kind of early in the morning, which meant he could have ten or so hours to go, but he could deal with that if it meant he got to sleep in his own bed tonight.</p>
<p>“You’ve got a good one, if you don’t mind me saying so.” Jessika said and it wasn’t until she nodded to Dom that Brian realized what she meant. “He’s been here all night, this is the first I’ve seen him asleep.” And then she used her hand to fan herself and winked at him, implying that Dom was devoted <em>and</em> hot.</p>
<p>Then she left, as if that was a regular thing that people ever said to him. Like <em>oh hey, your Mark is so handsome and he clearly isn’t an asshole, you are so lucky, okay bye! </em></p>
<p>His head hurt too much to think it over.</p>
<p>Idly, he wondered how Mia was doing. He was pretty sure she hadn’t actually gotten hurt but things got a little fuzzy around the second time his head got bashed in so he couldn’t be positive. Still, if Dom hadn’t left his side, then Mia couldn’t be that bad off. He would have switched off between them if they were both in the hospital.</p>
<p>Besides, he was pretty sure he remembered her throwing metal bowls or some shit at the asshole gunman.</p>
<p>It wasn’t fair that he had been awake for about a half an hour and he was still ready to fall asleep. Concussion again, obviously, but still.</p>
<p>There wasn’t any point in fighting it though, so Brian shut his eyes and in seconds he was out again.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>---</strong>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Someone’s hand was running through his hair.</p>
<p>It wasn’t often he registered a <em>nice</em> sensation right off the bat.</p>
<p>
  <em>“Hey, silver lining, at least you get to touch all you like.” </em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>“Quiet, Letty.” </em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>“I’m just saying!” </em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>“How’s Mia?” </em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>“She’s moved out of shaken up and straight into pissed. We’re gonna have to hold her back if this shit goes to trial or something. Like if she sees them again, she’s going to rip their faces off.” </em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>“Police say anything to her about a trial?” </em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>“Maybe but they said it would be fast. Pretty open shut kind of thing. I mean, we have cameras, how are they going to plead anything but guilty?” </em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>“Police say anything else?” </em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>“You mean about him? Nah, obviously self defense. He should get a key to the city or something. How’s his head?” </em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>“Pretty bad concussion, gonna be laid up for a while.” </em>
</p>
<p>Fuck that.</p>
<p>It took an extra second longer than it usually did when his brain asked his eyes to open but even with the lag, he managed it.</p>
<p>Dom’s hand froze, fingers still tangled in his hair but he smoothed it back once more before pulling away. Interesting.</p>
<p>“Hey,” Dom sat down on the bed beside him to make it easier to see him.</p>
<p>Brian yawned, he couldn’t help it. “Hey,” He said back.</p>
<p>“How do you feel?” Dom asked.</p>
<p>Letty was still standing but she seemed actually interested in the answer. The only thing creepier than her concern would be Vince’s. Here’s hoping <em>he</em> didn’t stop by to check in on him.</p>
<p>“Ready to go.” Brian answered sincerely.</p>
<p>Dom rolled his eyes, “When the doctor says you can, then sure. In the meanwhile, answer the actual question.”</p>
<p>Brian shrugged, “Concussions are all the same. I’ve done this before. Headache, general aches, whatever. I’m fine. How’s Mia?”</p>
<p>“She’s okay.” Letty answered for Dom. “Just be prepared to get seriously fussed over when you get back to the house.”</p>
<p>“Does fussing include tuna?” He joked, “If so I’m okay with it.”</p>
<p>Letty turned back to Dom, “You need to get this kid like a scan or something while he’s here. There’s something seriously wrong with him.” Before he could say anything back, she started for the door, “I’m out of here. Try not to get pummeled again, hero boy.”</p>
<p>And then she was gone.</p>
<p>“If she starts seriously calling me hero boy then we’re going to have a problem.” Brian said to Dom. He couldn’t think of many nicknames that he would like less.</p>
<p>Dom had a small sort of amused grin on his face which was totally at odds with the tense as fuck way he was holding the rest of his body. “She ain’t the only person saying it.”</p>
<p>Brian shot him a look, “You mean like the nurses? Great, we need to get out of here.”</p>
<p>If Brian was faster on the uptake, he would have registered the way Dom was looking at him. So sue him, he had a head injury. That meant Dom reaching out and cupping his cheek in his palm was sort of startling.</p>
<p>“Thank you.” Dom said simply. “For Mia. Thank you.”</p>
<p>He could have made a joke or something. Jerked his head away and sneered at Dom. Anything to get Dom to stop looking at him like he hung the moon or something. But all of that felt wrong.</p>
<p>“I don’t need to be thanked.” Brian shrugged, “But you’re welcome.”</p>
<p>The hand, thankfully, fell away. “Tell me how you really feel.” Dom requested, his eyes intent.</p>
<p>Getting asked so much was weird. Another first in this whole familiar injury/concussion thing. “Like I got beat up? It’s not that big a deal, Dom. I’m-”</p>
<p>“It is a big deal.” Dom cut him off, “It’s a huge fucking deal. When Mia called me…” He stopped talking like he physically couldn’t continue. In some ways, it looked like Dom was in more pain than he was. Maybe in the ways that really counted, he <em>was</em>.</p>
<p>Brian didn’t know what to say. Anything that he could come up with wouldn’t make Dom feel any better. The pain wasn’t so bad because it was familiar. Because he had been hurt like this before.</p>
<p>Dom wouldn’t be comforted to be told that.</p>
<p>“I missed her first call. Her second call too.” Dom said the words as if he were admitting some huge failing other than not answering a phone immediately. “I was with a customer, I should have…”</p>
<p>“Why would you think that two assholes walked into store with a gun?” It was Brian’s turn to cut Dom off to correct him and he was happy to do it.</p>
<p>The words didn’t seem to make Dom feel any better. “It was too early for the phone to be ringing off the hook like that. I should have known there was a problem.”</p>
<p>“When did she even call you?” Brian asked.</p>
<p>“After the cops, she said. I could hear you fighting with him. I could hear you and I couldn’t do a damned thing.” Dom’s fists clenched as though he still wanted to smash someone’s face in.</p>
<p>Hopefully Sleazy wasn’t anywhere close to his room.</p>
<p>Although, he was throbbing in enough places that he might actually be okay with Dom beating him to a pulp.</p>
<p>“Not my best fight.” Brian admitted. “I was so focused on making sure that he couldn’t get to the gun that I wasn’t really making the right moves.”</p>
<p>Dom shook his head, “You shouldn’t have had to do any of it.”</p>
<p>“Shit happens.” Brian shrugged.</p>
<p>“You still haven’t answered me.”</p>
<p>It took him a second to realize what Dom meant. <em>Tell me how you really feel</em>.</p>
<p>“My head hurts, I mean, that’s kind of how concussions are. Not awful, I know they’ve given me something for it, but it’s not bad. Bruised up, sore, especially my back. I…” He hesitated but the intense way that Dom was staring at him made him keep talking, “I know you don’t like hearing it but I’m not <em>not</em> used to this, okay? Like, even if you take my Dad out of the equation, I’m still a smart ass. Smart asses get in fights.”</p>
<p>He wasn’t sure he had ever explicitly said that his father hurt him before. Implied it, yeah, but straight up said that he was used to feeling like he’d been put through a meat grinder because of him? He didn’t think so.</p>
<p>Dom was quiet for a full minute. Processing maybe, or just trying to decide what to say back.</p>
<p>Hospitals weren’t quiet. They just weren’t. There was always someone talking, always alarms going off or announcements being made or phones ringing. <em>Something</em>.</p>
<p>But somehow the room seemed hushed.</p>
<p>Dom seemed more shaken up than Brian. He got why, he honestly did. Well, he mostly got it. It wasn’t like Brian was dying or anything, so what did a little pain really matter? He wasn’t nearly so worked up about it himself.</p>
<p>It was different for Dom though. Maybe it was just Dom, maybe the rest of the world would shrug this off like Brian was but he didn’t think so. Dom seemed like the one that reacted the <em>right way</em> to things. It definitely wasn’t Brian.</p>
<p>When Dom finally dropped his eyes, Brian felt sort of relieved. His stare was a lot.</p>
<p>Instead, Dom seemed to notice his hands. Brian hadn’t even really registered his bruised knuckles yet, they maybe hurt the least but that was only because he wasn’t regretful about it at all. He was glad he had hit hard enough to bruise.</p>
<p>Dom gently reached out and took his hand into his. He bowed his head over their hands and brushed a kiss over the abused skin.</p>
<p>It was maybe the softest thing anyone had ever done to him.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>---</strong>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Mia burst into tears at the sight of him.</p>
<p>He had half been expecting it. Mia didn’t seem like a weepy kind of girl but some people’s emotions cross-wired weird after stressful things. She was pissed off and grateful, so tears didn’t seem out of the realm of possibility.</p>
<p>He could have done without the overly gentle hug though.</p>
<p>“I’m so sorry!” Mia sobbed into his shoulder. “Brian, I’m so sorry. I should have done more to help you but I thought if I got in the way I would only make it worse. I wanted you to worry about yourself instead of me. I should have gone for the gun while you had him on the floor but it happened so fast… I’m so sorry and thank you so much and…”</p>
<p>“Hey, hey,” Brian awkwardly brought his arms around her. They hadn’t ever really hugged before so it was a little weird but he wasn’t so much of an asshole to <em>not</em> hug her when she was literally sobbing over him. “It’s okay. Hell, it was technically selfish. I couldn’t let the maker of the best tuna sandwiches ever get hurt, you know?”</p>
<p>Someone huffed out a laugh and Brian looked back towards the kitchen to find Vince leaning in the doorway.</p>
<p>Vince nodded at him, just once.</p>
<p>Brian nodded back.</p>
<p>Who knew he would enjoy Vince’s method of conveying gratitude best of all of them?</p>
<p>Mia pulled back from him and gently shifted some of his hair away from the cut on his face. She made a noise that sounded sort of like it should be coming out of a grandmother. “I’m like weeping on you and making you stand here. I’m sorry, let’s get you to bed, okay?”</p>
<p>He would have liked to say something badass… but his bed sounded too fucking good.</p>
<p>His head was somehow both in the clouds and also throbbing. He could deal with the pain, just like he kept saying to Dom, but that didn’t mean that checking out of it in favor of a nap didn’t sound pretty close to bliss.</p>
<p>When he turned to go start shuffling towards his bedroom the room spun a little. He froze, just for a second, but that was enough for the overprotective wonders that were the Toretto siblings.</p>
<p>“Hey,” Dom got close and put his hands on his shoulders to keep him from swaying – which he <em>wasn’t</em> going to do, thank you!</p>
<p>“Bed.” Mia said firmly. From behind, she gently nudged him forward.</p>
<p>Between the three of them, Brian managed to stay mostly upright on his way to his bedroom. Dom and Mia didn’t hesitate at the threshold, they just kept bringing him straight to the bed.</p>
<p>Brian kicked off his shoes, halfheartedly flinging them towards the opposite wall so they wouldn’t be in his way later as Mia pulled down the covers. She fussed for a few more minutes as Brian got in bed but a look from Dom had her pressing a kiss to his forehead like he was her toddler before she left the room. Dom didn’t turn to watch her go or even look away to mess with his blankets himself. He just stared at Brian.</p>
<p>“Don’t want to.” Brian mumbled. Getting vertical made the need for sleep crank up like two hundred degrees.</p>
<p>“Don’t want to what?” Dom asked as he crouched down beside Brian’s head on the pillow.</p>
<p>“You have your talk face on.” Brian waved a hand in the general direction of Dom’s face. “Like you have serious shit you want to hash out. I’m tired. Go away.”</p>
<p>Dom chuckled, “I’ll make it quick.”</p>
<p>“You keep me up to thank me again I’m kicking you in the face.”</p>
<p>“Noted,” Dom rolled his eyes at Brian and the sight of him doing something that was usually Brian’s job got him to put a little more focus on what the guy was trying to say. “Listen, I just want to make sure I have your permission to come in here the next few days. Someone has to check on you and I can’t do it from the doorway. I won’t snoop through your stuff and I’m not going to bother you unless I have to wake you up.”</p>
<p><em>Oh</em>.</p>
<p>The reminder of the household rule about not entering someone else’s room unless you had permission was a little surprising. Maybe it shouldn’t have been. Dom had certainly proved that he took it seriously, even if Brian hadn’t believed he would in the beginning. Another thing he had been wrong about.</p>
<p>“Yeah,” He remembered to say when the silence dragged on just a few seconds too long, “Yeah, do what you have to do.”</p>
<p>Dom nodded and stood, “You need anything before I go?”</p>
<p>“Unconsciousness.” Brian answered seriously.</p>
<p>That got Dom to crack another smile, “Have at it.” And then he turned and left, closing the door behind him.</p>
<p>Normally, he would have had to spend at least an hour staring at the ceiling analyzing that exchange. Now he didn’t have any of the mental capacity required to do it.</p>
<p>His eyes shut and in seconds, he was asleep.</p>
<p> </p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>No cliffhangers this time, see? ;) </p>
<p>I would love to know what you think of the chapter!</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0013"><h2>13. Chapter Thirteen</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <hr/>
<p>
  <strong>Chapter Thirteen </strong>
</p>
<hr/>
<p> </p>
<p>Brian hoped, from the deepest part of his heart, that wherever Sleazy was right now he was having his fingernails ripped out or something.</p>
<p>He woke up with a dizzy groan that reverberated through his skull until he had to brave moving to roll on his side with his head half off the bed just in case he hurled. No way was he going out by choking on his own puke. The sun looked like it was setting, even though someone had thoughtfully closed the curtains on his window to block more light.</p>
<p>Had it been like that when he had fallen asleep or had Dom come in and done it after?</p>
<p> “Uh, Brian?”</p>
<p>Blearily, Brian looked towards the door. Vince was hovering in the half open doorway looking at him like he was particularly pathetic looking.</p>
<p>“Go’way,” He mumbled back.</p>
<p>Vince raised an eyebrow at him before leaning a little back and calling, “Dom, your princess looks like shit! Come here!”</p>
<p>The volume alone made him groan.</p>
<p>The words were barely out of Vince’s mouth before Brian could hear footsteps rushing towards them.</p>
<p>
  <em>Great, more people! </em>
</p>
<p>He clenched his eyes shut before he had to see the expression on Dom’s face. The last thing he needed was dark, worried eyes or some intense frown.</p>
<p>Dom’s footsteps got quieter the closer he got. The door shut and then he could hear the creaking of fabric as Dom knelt down beside him, “You feel nauseous?”</p>
<p>“Yeah,” He answered.</p>
<p>A metal trashcan got set down in front of him. “Just in case.” Dom said before he laid a big hand down on Brian’s shoulder, “Try and take deep breaths, okay?”</p>
<p>His first instinct was to tell Dom to fuck off. He didn’t need breathing tips… but his stomach lurched and fighting for independence from his mother hen of a Mark wasn’t nearly as important as it normally would have been.</p>
<p>Dom pulled in a deep exaggerated breath so Brian could hear it and he did his best to copy it. He couldn’t hold it so long and was kind of shakily pulling them in but he was trying.</p>
<p>“That’s good, just breathe through it.”</p>
<p>Dom’s voice was a soothing, low rumble that didn’t send any sharp spikes of pain into his battered brain. It was steady in a way that he didn’t even realize he desperately needed.</p>
<p><em>Dom</em>, he was starting to realize, was steady in a way that he desperately needed.</p>
<p>The idea that whatever biological quirk or all powerful being that decided this Mark shit actually might know what they were doing some of the time was ridiculous.</p>
<p>Brian wasn’t sure how long they stayed like that; Dom’s hand rubbing his shoulder and arm in smooth, almost hypnotic strokes that were timed to the deep breathing that was starting to actually make a dent in Brian’s need to hurl. Hesitantly, he cracked his eyes open just a little and saw Dom was actually looking out the little sliver of window not covered by blinds.</p>
<p>Knowing he wasn’t staring at Brian helped.</p>
<p>He shut his eyes again but that little bit of tension that was still in his noodle-like limbs drained away.</p>
<p>It was about then that he realized he had curled up so tight his joints were starting to ache. He uncurled slowly, wary of pissing off something inside of him.</p>
<p>“Thanks,” Brian said after a minute. “I don’t think I’m going to puke anymore.” Cautiously, he rolled onto his back. The loss of Dom’s hand on his arm was immediately noticeable and he didn’t have the strength to feel weird about it.</p>
<p>“I’ll leave this close.” Dom said as he moved the trashcan up by the head of the bed. “You feel dizzy or anything?”</p>
<p>He knew better than to shake his head, “No, maybe a little when I woke up but I think that was more the headache and my stomach than anything else.”</p>
<p>“You can have more pills in about an hour.” Dom promised. “And something to eat.”</p>
<p>Brian groaned, “I’ve never been less excited but also more excited in my life.”</p>
<p>“Any requests? Before you say it, I don’t think tuna is a good idea right now.”</p>
<p>Tuna salad had never sounded less appealing. “Me neither. Everything sounds bad but maybe like, a banana?”</p>
<p>Dom sounded unimpressed, “A banana and…?”</p>
<p>“Can I start with the banana and see how it goes from there?” He was really trying not to whine.</p>
<p>“First course can be a banana but you best believe there’s going to be a second course.” Dom sounded mostly unapologetic about it too. There was no point appealing to Mia either. He might have build up some extra goodwill with her but the Torettos took meal-skipping seriously.</p>
<p>“I’ll aim the puke at you, then.” Brian cut an annoyed look over at Dom.</p>
<p>He wasn’t expecting the sort of mischievous smile he got in return. “That’s not one of my kinks, sorry.”</p>
<p>Brian barked out an abrupt laugh that was kind of worth the pain, “Jesus, are you flirting with me or is this some sort of stress relieving comedy thing you’re trying?”</p>
<p>“Maybe a little bit of both.” Dom shrugged.</p>
<p>It should have weirded him out or been annoying. He shouldn’t have thought it was funny.</p>
<p>But the Brian who had wanted some sort of indication from Dom that the kiss on the beach meant something without meaning too much of something actually appreciated it. It made him feel less… alone maybe? Or mixed up? Or something, he wasn’t sure and his head hurt too much to think it through.</p>
<p>“I don’t think I’m capable of finishing this conversation.” Brian warned him. “Like I’m tapping out. I can’t talk through kinks with you right now.”</p>
<p>“Why not? You’re already in bed.”</p>
<p>Brian snorted, “When did you become funny? Did I get punched into another dimension?”</p>
<p>Dom stood with a small smile, “I’ve always been funny.” He said before leaning forward and literally straightening out Brian’s blankets, like that was a thing that he was just allowed to do. “You wanna nap a little until dinner?”</p>
<p>“Until you serve me my banana and pain meds in bed? Sure.” Brian threw out there even though he knew it wasn’t going just like that.</p>
<p>Dom shook his head fondly, “Keep dreaming.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>---</strong>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>First course was a banana, as specifically ordered.</p>
<p>Second course was non-negotiable rice. Pretty bland, just a little butter in it. Brian dealt with it.</p>
<p>Dessert was his dearly beloved pills.</p>
<p>After that he didn’t remember a whole lot but that was okay by him.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>---</strong>
</p>
<p>
  <em>“Police called – the one Brian knocked out at the start took a plea deal on the other guy. They think the case is going to be pretty open shut. They’ll need to get a statement from Brian and Mia then they’re done.” </em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>“And they didn’t say anything about…?” </em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>“No, nothing new about him going back. I think it’s gonna stay that way.” </em>
</p>
<p>Brian tried to decide if opening his eyes was worth it.</p>
<p>
  <em>“Thank fuck.” </em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>“Mia’s laying down, I’ll tell her when she gets up if you’re with him.” </em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>“Garage good?” </em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>“Letty and I have it under control. Leon’s got some rotation going for the store. What’s that older lady’s name again?” </em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>“Luisa?” </em>
</p>
<p>It took too long to realize that it was Vince and Dom having some sort of pow-pow. At his door, maybe? He wasn’t sure.</p>
<p>On the one hand, he wanted them to stop talking. His head was trying to focus on what they were saying as if he didn’t have a nasty headache.</p>
<p>But on the other hand, Dom’s low, steady voice was soothing.</p>
<p>Vince’s was not.</p>
<p>
  <em>“Yeah, her. She’s working with him to keep things covered to give Mia a break for a bit. Leon’s going to be there every day for a while until the new security system is in.” </em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>“Should’ve done it sooner. Shit.” </em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>“Store’s been there how many years? No one’s ever tried to hit it. If these guys weren’t new in town idiots, no one would have. Who would want to mess with us over a couple hundred in the register?” </em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>“The world is full of idiots. I should have known better.” </em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>“We’re fixing it now. It won’t happen again.” </em>
</p>
<p>It was always kind of weird to Brian, the dynamic between Vince and Dom.</p>
<p>He shifted onto his side and the two of the stopped talking. That was barely on his register though, because moving reminded his body that he had to piss in the worst way.</p>
<p>Reluctantly, Brian opened his eyes. Sure enough, Vince and Dom were standing at his doorway, both of them watching him wake up like hawks. Even Vince looked vaguely concerned and Brian didn’t really know what to do with that.</p>
<p>“Hey,” Dom said sort of like a greeting but then Brian started to push himself up to sitting and he repeated it again a little sharper. “Hey!”</p>
<p>“Gotta pee,” Brian said, just to cut the conversation about laying down and resting. He was all on board with sleeping his life away at the moment but his bladder had other plans. “Unless that’s one of your kinks, then don’t give me shit.”</p>
<p>Vince groaned and walked away.</p>
<p>“Neither, actually.” Dom answered.</p>
<p>Brian managed to swing his legs out of the bed just in time to bend over them laughing, “Jesus, should we just finish off the list of the wild ones? Where are you on necrophilia? Horses?”</p>
<p>“Not interested.” Dom said as he helped Brian stand, “Animals in general are a no.”</p>
<p>It was a nice surprise when the room didn’t start spinning around him once he was upright. “Latex fetish suits?”</p>
<p>“Sounds claustrophobic but you can wear one if you want.” Dom offered generously.</p>
<p>Brian just groaned. It was all fun and games until Dom implied that they might actually do something to each other.</p>
<p>The shuffle down the hall happened with Dom’s shoulder under his arm and his hand around his waist whether he wanted it to or not. He still had that limp noodle feeling running through his body and even though the pills he kept agreeing to take kept he pain from being intense, they weren’t doing loads for making him feel solid.</p>
<p>The second they hit the bathroom door though, Brian pushed Dom away, “You stay out here.”</p>
<p>Dom didn’t look happy, “Door stays unlocked.”</p>
<p>He knew better than to think he was going to get a better deal. “Fine, perv.”</p>
<p>The joke made Dom laugh and Brian shoving the door shut in his face kept it going for an extra few seconds. That gave Brian the chance to get over to the vanity by clinging to the wall, pretty much. Hopefully Dom laughing and the door being shut would muffle any dragging sounds that came from doing it.</p>
<p>He braced himself on the counter and took a good look at the damage in the mirror.</p>
<p>Okay, he maybe looked a little like roadkill.</p>
<p>Their concern was still excessive but maybe it was slightly <em>less</em> excessive than it had been before he’d gotten a good look at himself.</p>
<p>He was not telling Dom or Mia that though.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>---</strong>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>The next few days were just as shitty as the first. Concussions were the fucking worst. They took too long to heal. He spent most of his time asleep. Dom hovered. Mia hovered. Food was pushed on him. Pills were coveted.</p>
<p>He and Dom also managed to rule out foot fetishes, cross dressing and religious roleplay.</p>
<p>Helpful but they were also getting close to like, the more regular level kinks which was place Brian didn’t want to explore with Dom. Especially while his brain still occasionally felt like it might leak out his ear.</p>
<p>He also started refusing the pills. It was almost weird to him that he’d even agreed to them in the first place because they made him loopy and he <em>never</em> was okay with that. Examining it too closely wasn’t high on his list of things to waste the pain of concentration on.</p>
<p>Still, he needed to let them go. Dom and Mia weren’t happy and his brain wasn’t very happy either but he didn’t care and nothing they said changed his mind. </p>
<p>For the first time since he’d left for the store that last morning, Brian wandered out to the kitchen. He had been exclusively on a cycle between his bed, the hall and the bathroom and it was getting old.</p>
<p>There was no one in the kitchen when he got there and that was fine. He didn’t hear anyone in the living room either, so either most of them were outside or just out in general.</p>
<p>That just meant that no one had to see him ease himself down onto a chair like a busted up senior citizen.</p>
<p>This little excursion didn’t really have a plan. He mostly just wanted a change of scenery for a few minutes. He knew better than to start reading or watching TV or something like that. His concussion was just getting to the place where the all-the-time-pain was going to switch to just-when-you-focus pain. Right on schedule, in his experience. He didn’t want to focus hard on something and open the door to the jackhammers again.</p>
<p>He was getting seriously nostalgic for anything that wasn’t his bed, although his affection for his bed was still strong. Going to the garage sounded great. Hell, he’d even play Jesse’s game again – he was <em>that</em> bored.</p>
<p>The backdoor opened and Leon came inside. He went to the fridge and got halfway there before he stopped and saw Brian sitting at the table and he stopped to stare for a second. To be fair, he probably looked weird just sitting there doing nothing.</p>
<p>“Are you supposed to be out of bed?” Leon asked but he wasn’t harping about it. It was more conversational.</p>
<p>Brian gave him a tired wave his hand, “No one said I had to stay in bed.”</p>
<p>He appreciated it when Leon went back to his original mission, grabbing a beer from the fridge. Then he sat down opposite Brian like that had been his plan all along. Leon was smooth like that.</p>
<p>“I think it was implied,” Leon said, “Besides, Dom might have a coronary if he sees you just sitting out here alone.”</p>
<p>“Dom can deal.” Brian dismissed it. “Besides, he’s been close to a coronary for days. Dude needs to chill.”</p>
<p>Leon laughed, “He does, but cut him some slack. You scared the shit out of him.”</p>
<p>Brian rolled his eyes, “Since when are you on Team Overprotective?” There was something that shifted on Leon’s face that Brian didn’t know how to interpret. It wasn’t anger or sadness or something really negative, but it wasn’t happy either. His smile went a little more fixed and his eyes got a little older. “What?”</p>
<p>There was silence for a second, like Leon was weighing what to say. “I don’t think I’ve met anyone quite like you, man. Someone who sees Marks the way you do. It’s hard to know what to say to you sometimes, because things I thought were established fact are like, resented opinions to you.”</p>
<p>“Say whatever you want to say.” Brian said slowly. “As long as you’re not demanding I do something or feel something, I’m not going to get pissed.”</p>
<p>“Now, maybe.” Leon leaned back in his chair, “But that’s new. You’ve eased up. Good job on that, by the way. Besides, no one has ever told you what to do or how to feel. We just react to what we thought were facts about how anyone else <em>would </em>feel and you take it like condemnation.”</p>
<p>Were they arguing? Was this an argument? With anyone else it might have been. With Mia definitely. Dom too. Letty and Vince even. Leon hadn’t ever really said anything to him about his opinion on Marks. Hell, Brian wasn’t sure he had ever even heard Leon talk to other people about it either.</p>
<p>“Do you even realize what every other Mark would have done if what happened to you happened to theirs? They would have been at your side every second, they would have been doing everything for you while you recovered. Dom had to get permission to go in your room every couple of hours to make sure you’re still breathing. And I’m not saying you’re wrong for feeling the way you do about it, but Dom’s not wrong for feeling how <em>he</em> feels about it either. Technically speaking, Dom’s reacting the way ninety-seven percent of the world’s population would. Not his fault that he got a Mark who was raised by the three percent.” Leon said. There wasn’t any judgment in his voice. He wasn’t trying to convince Brian of anything. That made more of a difference than Brian would have thought possible.</p>
<p>“So what are you saying I should be doing then?” Brian couldn’t help but wonder.</p>
<p>Leon shrugged, like that whole speech had just been an essay question from a kid who researched too much but didn’t have a real firm conclusion. “Nothing. You do what you think is right. I’m just pointing out that Dom’s <em>not</em> doing what he thinks is right. He’s fighting every instinct he’s got do to things the way you want them done. He’s trying to protect you and take care of you the way any other Mark would. The way I would, if you were my girl.”</p>
<p>And there it was again, that weird look in Leon’s eye.</p>
<p>“How do you know you match a girl?” Brian asked even though he felt like he was asking the wrong question.</p>
<p>Leon stared at him for a second and Brian knew the answer wasn’t going to be that usual thing about being so straight it was impossible for him to get a guy. Some people had some weird held-over belief that same sex Marks were wrong somehow. Leon didn’t seem like that kind of dude.</p>
<p>“Because I already met her.” Leon said finally. “Our families were friends, I met her the day she was born. My mom went to visit her mom in the hospital and did the gush over the newborn thing, saw her Mark, realized it looked a hell of a lot like mine and the hospital did a Match analysis for us.”</p>
<p>Brian felt his stomach sink. He hadn’t ever met Leon’s Mark. He hadn’t even heard that Leon had one.</p>
<p>There was no way this story was going to end happy.</p>
<p>Leon must have seen it on his face because he just laughed a little. There was lightness there, like it didn’t hurt so bad anymore, but there was also a sadness that was old and bone deep. “Yeah, you guessed it. She was two years younger than me and we were inseparable when we were little. Grew up together. Planned our whole lives by the time I was nine. Then when she was eleven, she got sick with leukemia. It happened really fast. Died in my arms and everything.”</p>
<p>“I’m sorry.” Brian said. Sorry it had happened and sorry for anything he might have said along the way that spit in the face of Leon’s loss.</p>
<p>“Sara would have liked you. She liked smartasses with hearts of gold.” Leon grinned.</p>
<p>Brian didn’t think he had a heart of gold but he didn’t dare argue the point.</p>
<p>Leon took a long drink of his beer. “Just so you don’t have to ask, no one else has met their Marks. Just me and Dom. Mia is registered with every serious database there is, just like Dom, but no hits yet. Vince is so hung up on Mia he won’t look. I think he registered with one of the majors back when Mia was still just a kid but he hasn’t gone any further. Letty refuses to look too. She thinks that poor bastard should do the work to find <em>her</em>, not the other way around. Jesse’s hacked a couple of databases and he thinks he’s found his Mark but he’s too nervous to reach out and get a formal analysis done to see if they match. She’s fifteen years older than him, established with a good career. She probably makes bank. He thinks he’s not good enough. I keep trying to tell him that if she’s recorded in a database then that means she’s game to be found but he won’t listen. Honestly, I’m pretty sure she’s one of those high-powered caretaker types who would just love the cute little project that is Jesse.”</p>
<p>Brian had known them for months now and he had never once asked. Had never wanted to know, really.</p>
<p>He didn’t know what it meant that he wanted to know now.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>---</strong>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>His conversation with Leon sort of echoed around in his head all night.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>---</strong>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Brian figured it was progress when he actually changed his outfit the next morning when he woke up. Not jeans, there was no way all his bruises were there yet, but a fresh pair of sweats and a t-shirt that looked more like something he would wear out of the house than something a invalid had been lounging in for just over a week.</p>
<p>When he heard everyone start congregating quietly in the kitchen, Brian shuffled his way in.</p>
<p>“Look who’s conscious!” Letty said it louder than anyone had spoken to him since he’d left the hospital but still quieter than she would have before.</p>
<p>“I’m conscious plenty,” Brian grumbled as he made his way to usual seat at the table, “I’m just also taking this opportunity to not have to hear your voice.”</p>
<p>Vince laughed, “Ooh, Brian the bitch has returned.”</p>
<p>That got him a glare from Dom.</p>
<p>The glare didn’t seem to rein Vince in at all but Brian didn’t mind. It was weird that they were happy to see him on a few different levels. One, he hadn’t gone anywhere. Two, he was only just settling into the idea that they liked him. Three, ditto for the idea that he liked them back.</p>
<p>Actually, add in a fourth – just Vince, all on his own. The points still stood but for Vince they needed extra emphasis.</p>
<p>Mia leaned in and kissed the side of Brian’s head, right by one of his mostly healed cuts. “I’m glad you’re up for breakfast,” Of course she was, she lived to feed people, “What can I get you?”</p>
<p>“This is all great.” Brian said, gesturing vaguely at the spread in front of him. He wasn’t so nauseous anymore so he actually meant it. He was maybe not ready for the ham and cheese omelets Mia had made, but the rest of it looked good.</p>
<p>Mia stayed hovering by him, like she wanted to serve him or something. “You’re not my mother and this is not the weird family reunion picnic – no making my plate. Sit down and eat, Mia.”</p>
<p>He was a little worried she would take some sort of offense to that or that she or Dom might get weird about the mention of his mother but she just laughed.</p>
<p>“Fine, fine, I’ll stop hovering.” Mia said good-naturedly.</p>
<p>“We should do that.” Letty said sort of out of the blue while Brian started grabbing some toast and jam.</p>
<p>Mia sat down and asked, “Do what?”</p>
<p>“A picnic.” Letty answered, “We haven’t done any in months,”</p>
<p>Since Brian had gotten there, apparently, because he hadn’t been to any picnics, cook-outs or anything like that. Not that he blamed Dom for not wanting to show off his angry Mark or anything.</p>
<p>“Too loud,” Dom said shortly and Brian knew he was thinking about his concussion-based sensitivity to noise.</p>
<p>Letty rolled her eyes, “I’m not saying let’s have a neighborhood block party. Something small.”</p>
<p>They were all warming up to the idea and if they really hadn’t had one in a while because of him then he felt sort of obligated to say, “Sounds cool.”</p>
<p>Dom turned to look at him and Brian could <em>feel</em> his eyes. He was trying to read the truth of that little statement straight from his face. Anytime Dom was surprised by something he said, that was what he did. Whether that was like a lack of trust or some sort of incredulous <em>what?</em> kind of reaction, Brian wasn’t sure.</p>
<p>Either way, he was getting pretty good at looking blank when Dom tried to read his soul or something.</p>
<p>“Maybe next weekend,” Dom said finally. “When you’re awake a little more.”</p>
<p><em>When you’re less likely to puke because of sunlight or noise </em>was what he meant.</p>
<p>“Great, there’s a few guys I want to invite.” Letty said and Brian was absolutely interested in seeing Letty in some sort of weird circle of dudes who were trying to score with her. It sounded like the sort of trainwreck he and Mia could watch with fascination and horror.</p>
<p>The rest of them started talking about who they would want to come before Dom laid down the law and said everyone got two invites only. The way they were talking made it sound like their usual cookouts were massive, multi-hour things. Brian wasn’t sad that Dom was scaling it back, even if it was yet another of his overprotective shows.</p>
<p>“You could invite Rome if you want,” Dom said to him quietly while the rest of them hashed out who was inviting who.</p>
<p>That wasn’t a bad idea. He had talked to Rome exactly once since the whole <em>Brian got beat up by an asshole with a gun</em> thing had gone down and he knew Rome was going to want to see his in-one-piece-body at some point. Might as well kill two birds with one stone. “I’ll call him.” Brian said. He very carefully didn’t say <em>thank you</em>. Neither one of them would have liked that.</p>
<p>Dom smiled at him, like him inviting Rome was some big victory. Joke was on him because Rome could eat and drink them into credit card debt.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>---</strong>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Brian wasn’t sure if it was an everybody thing or a <em>grew up with fucked up parents </em>thing but sometimes he just woke up immediately and without any real transition. Like something deep inside of his brain was like <em>you need to get the fuck up <strong>now</strong></em> and flipped some switch and then his eyes were open.</p>
<p>It pretty much always came in handy. It started because he’d hear his mother crying, either right beside him nearly silently sobbing as she stared at him and tried to figure out what the fuck to do with their mess of a situation or on the other side of their house behind closed doors. After her, it morphed into a defense mechanism against his asshole of a father who would come home late and angry looking for him. It served him well in juvie too, waking him up in time to keep him from getting into shit he didn’t want.</p>
<p>When he woke up out of nowhere this time, it was to Dom sitting by his bed just staring at him.</p>
<p>“Dom?” He asked, already totally awake.</p>
<p>Dom looked a little startled. He pulled himself halfway up into a weird crouch like he was going to try to run before Brian woke up except he was already awake and there wasn’t much point in moving.</p>
<p>“What’s going on?” Brian asked before Dom could vault himself out of the room or whatever he was gearing up to do.</p>
<p>“Nothing,” Dom answered and though his voice was kind of hushed, there was also a weirdly thick quality to it. How Brian could tell when Dom’s voice was already really deep, he wasn’t sure.</p>
<p>Brian glanced a little blearily at the clock on his bedside table. “You’re doing nothing at three in the fucking morning?”</p>
<p>“Sorry,” Dom said quietly, “Didn’t mean to wake you up.”</p>
<p>He still sounded off and Brian frowned at him, “Well, I’m up so whatever. What’s the deal?”</p>
<p><em>What’s wrong?</em> That was the actual question.</p>
<p>“I said nothing.” Dom insisted.</p>
<p>“Don’t bother saying something if it isn’t true.” Brian said evenly, throwing Dom’s own words back in his face. He didn’t do it angrily. He <em>wasn’t</em> angry. It was just a reminder. The rule went both ways.</p>
<p>Throwing Dom’s own rule back in his face was less satisfying than it had been other times but the effect was the same. A narrowing of his eyes, a pause where he weighed the options and then…</p>
<p>“Had a dream. Wanted to make sure you were okay.”</p>
<p>Translation: <em>Had a <strong>nightmare</strong>, wanted to <strong>watch you sleep</strong> until I could shake it off.</em></p>
<p>“Huh,” Brian said and he could see Dom tensing, “Were you trapped in Letty’s apartment and none of the doors worked so you had to dive into a pile of garbage against the wall to escape out the window except more and more garbage starts coming from the ceiling blocking you off from the window? Because I’ve had that dream and man, it sucks.”</p>
<p>Dom just stared.</p>
<p>Brian sat up in bed, swinging his legs out of the covers and letting his bare feet touch the floor. He was sitting in front of where Dom was kneeling and the imagery of it was a little unsettling but whatever. “Wanna go drive?”</p>
<p>And Dom just stared some more.</p>
<p>He wasn’t sure why, honestly. Dom had been nice to him after his nightmare, why did Dom think Brian was going to return the favor with dickishness?</p>
<p>He poked Dom with his toe, “Are you alive in there?”</p>
<p>“I’m alive.” Dom answered after a too long delay.</p>
<p>“Good, I am too. Are we driving or not?” Brian asked.</p>
<p>“You can’t drive with a concussion, doc’s orders.” Dom said the words almost mechanically. It wasn’t surprising that he had care instructions so hammered into his head he could spew them out even when his brain seemed to be sort of half crashed.</p>
<p>Brian fought the urge to roll his eyes, “<em>You</em> aren’t concussed. You drive. I sit. Maybe there’s a beach involved. Maybe not, if that’s not your idea of zen. What’s your idea of zen?”</p>
<p>“Driving really fast.” Dom answered quietly, “So fast I can’t think of anything else.”</p>
<p>“I’ve got no objections.” Brian promised.</p>
<p>They stared at each other.</p>
<p>“You are so fucking perfect.” Dom said finally.</p>
<p>Brian was glad the lighting was virtually nonexistent because he was maybe blushing and what the absolute fuck was with that? Thirteen year old girls blushed. <em>He</em> absolutely did not blush.</p>
<p>“Agree to disagree, weirdo. Are we going or not?”</p>
<p>Dom finally stood and Brian watched him shuffled towards the front door. He took the spare second to slide on his shoes before following.</p>
<p><em>Fucking perfect</em>.</p>
<p>Brian rolled his eyes at nothing. Dom was on crack, clearly.</p>
<p>Brian was a lot of things but perfect wasn’t one of them.</p>
<p>He was going to pretend that was down to the weird after-nightmare headspace and leave it there.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>---</strong>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>If one more person asked him if his head was okay or if the music was too loud or if the sun was too bright or if he needed a pill or if he needed to go lay down Brian was going to start throwing punches.</p>
<p>Not at Mia, she was the only person exempt because he got why she was all panicky about his brain. He could deal with her, just her, but the rest of them needed to chill.</p>
<p>He had at least one person from the team standing at his side at all times. As more and more people trickled into the Toretto backyard and Dom’s glare at Letty got so strong even <em>she</em> had to squirm a little, their protectiveness ramped up.</p>
<p>Even <em>Vince</em> was getting in on the act. Granted, he’d been the one to offer pills of dubious sourcing so that wasn’t too weird but still. He hated Vince’s concern.</p>
<p>Dom seemed to circle around him like Brian was the sun or something. He didn’t hover, probably mostly because he knew Brian would kick him or something, but he never strayed far.</p>
<p>More than a few people commented on them <em>finding each other</em>. Thank fuck nobody had suggested this picnic thing a few months ago because Brian would have definitely assaulted someone by now. Mostly he just gave a pained smile and the person got a pointed look like they had been warned to leave him alone and how dare they forget it.</p>
<p>When Rome showed up an hour in Brian was beyond happy to see him.</p>
<p>He had Leon as his babysitter when Rome sauntered up out of nowhere with a hot dog already in hand, “I don’t even know who gave this to me, man. You people have a thing about feeding the world.”</p>
<p>Leon laughed, “Torettos do, it’s one of their things. There’s some extended family here so the food is going to be flowing for hours.”</p>
<p>Brian had already met an aunt, two uncles and six cousins. Who the cousins belonged to got explained too fast for him to keep up with but they all seemed wired similarly to Dom and Mia. It was like they as a group weren’t happy unless they had someone to mother.</p>
<p>“How’s the brain?” Rome asked him.</p>
<p>“Still in my skull.” Brian assured him with mock seriousness, “After that I can’t really say.”</p>
<p>“Good to hear, man. Fuckin’ idiot, messing with my boy,” Rome reached out and tried to ruffle his hair but he let Brian dodge without pursuing.</p>
<p>Leon just laughed, the traitor.</p>
<p>“Got something wild to tell you, straight from Eddie’s mouth,” Rome said and he gave Brian a look that he wasn’t sure how to interpret. His eyes cut to Leon’s real quick before returning to Brian’s but his smile didn’t falter. “You got somewhere quiet I can blow your mind?”</p>
<p>Eddie was one of Rome’s own cousins and Brian couldn’t imagine what Rome could possibly want to tell him. The guy was kind of scary, honestly. Rome was making it sound like this would be on the funny side of wild and there hadn’t ever been a moment of humor in his cousin’s life.</p>
<p>Never let it be said Brian couldn’t take a hint.</p>
<p>“Sure,” He said easily, “We can go chill in my room. Be nice to sit in the shade for a bit. Leon, when Dom notices I’m gone, tell him to chill, all right?”</p>
<p>“You got it,” Leon said, taking a few steps back from them. </p>
<p>Never let it be said Leon couldn’t take a hint either.</p>
<p>Rome and Brian waded through the crowd of people, making a straight shot for the back door. It took way too long for the actual distance that it was but when they made it inside and the noise cut by about half, Brian relaxed more than he thought he would.</p>
<p>He jerked his head to the side, “My room is over here.”</p>
<p>Rome followed quietly, not saying a word until the door was shut behind them.</p>
<p>“Your head really fine?” He asked when they were alone.</p>
<p>Brian sat down on his bed and leaned back against the wall, “Concussions are concussions, Rome. I’m getting real tired of answering the question.”</p>
<p>Rome sat down on the floor opposite him and there was something troubled in the way he was looking at Brian.</p>
<p>“What is it?” Brian asked.</p>
<p>“I wasn’t lying, Eddie did tell me something that you should know.” Rome started talking and Brian tensed, waiting to hear whatever this shit news was going to be, “You know how I’ve been asking around about Toretto?”</p>
<p>Rome had something to tell him about <em>Dom?</em></p>
<p>“Yeah,” Brian answered, suddenly a hell of a lot more interested.</p>
<p>“You know he went to jail?” Rome asked.</p>
<p>Jesus, Rome was going to tell him what Dom had gone to jail for. “He said so at the start. Never told me why though. They all like, refuse to talk about it.”</p>
<p>“Assault.” Rome said, “In some ways you could even call it murder, honestly. He beat this shit out of a guy so bad he’s brain damaged for life, Brian.”</p>
<p><em>Well shit</em>…</p>
<p>Brian hadn’t ever thought too much about why Dom had gone to jail. He had always figured that it was something car related like him.</p>
<p>There was a creak in the hallway outside the door and Brian sat up so quickly his head spun a little. He opened the door and found Mia standing there with her hand up like she was going to knock. “Brian! Jeez, you scared me. I saw you come inside, are you feeling okay?”</p>
<p>The words were right but there was something in her eyes that made him think she had maybe heard what Rome had said. He wasn’t sure he cared but it was interesting that she wasn’t owning up to it. “Yeah, Rome and I are just catching up. Quieter in here.”</p>
<p>“Okay, let me know if you guys need anything.” Mia smiled tightly and turned back around to go outside again. Brian watched her for a second, and tried to decide if he wanted to call her back and figure out what she had heard.</p>
<p>Or, call her back and confront her with Rome had just told him and see what she said.</p>
<p>The second that idea came into his head, he dismissed it.</p>
<p>There was only one person he wanted to have tell him what had happened.</p>
<p> </p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>A massive thank you for all the support you guys showed the last chapter! </p>
<p>Please let me know what you think! :)</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0014"><h2>14. Chapter Fourteen</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <hr/>
<p>
  <strong>Chapter Fourteen </strong>
</p>
<hr/>
<p> </p>
<p>Rome stayed for a while, long past after most of the other people left. He asked if Brian wanted help getting away from Dom. He asked if Brian needed some sort of weapon for his own protection. He asked if Brian wanted to just outright leave with him.</p>
<p>He said no.</p>
<p>Once he would have gone. He would have used this as the ammunition he needed to go back to juvie and get away from his Mark. It would have been easy.</p>
<p>Honestly, he was a little surprised that he had been released to a violent offender. There had to be a reason. There had to be something that made Dom trustworthy in the eyes of the law. Mark or not, Brian was still underage – they wouldn’t have just dropped him off with a suspected serial killer. Dom wasn’t that, obviously, but he wasn’t squeaky clean either.</p>
<p>It was late, long after the party had ended, when someone knocked on his door.</p>
<p>Brian wasn’t surprised to see Dom standing there.</p>
<p>Neither of them said anything. Dom turned and started heading towards the garage that Brian had still literally never done more than stand in the doorway to. The car in it was <em>nice</em>. Maybe not his personal style but it was a beast that he could and did respect.</p>
<p>No part of him hesitated at the door like he would have even a few months ago. Yeah, he would have wanted answers even then but the combination of being alone in that garage with Dom and the sort of silent command of Dom just knocking on his door then going in there would have kept him at the doorway.</p>
<p>Now, he couldn’t have stayed in his room even if he tried.</p>
<p>Dom walked in first, flicking on a light so they weren’t standing in the dark. It was late and Vince had left with some girl so it was just Mia home but Brian still shut the door behind them. A message, although he wasn’t sure who it was meant for.</p>
<p>“My dad’s.” Dom said as he stroked a reverent finger across the hood. “He and I built her together. 900 horses of Detroit muscle. It’s a beast”</p>
<p>This felt more like the Dom that Brian knew, at least, “You’re not wrong.”</p>
<p>“Know what she ran at Palmdale?” Dom looked up at him with a shy sort of smile on his face. It almost felt out of place for what Brian was pretty sure they were talking about.</p>
<p>“No, what did she run?” He asked without anything but curiosity in his voice.</p>
<p>“9 seconds flat. My Dad was driving. So much torque the chassis twisted coming of the line, barely kept it on the track.” He sounded so incredibly proud. Brian knew he loved his father so it wasn’t surprising for all that it was foreign to him.</p>
<p>“So what’s your best time?” This question felt safer than any about Dom’s father.</p>
<p>Dom’s face fell a little, closed off in a second. “I’ve never driven her.”</p>
<p>“Why not?”</p>
<p>The look on Dom’s face was open and almost raw with honesty, “Scares the shit out of me.”</p>
<p>Dom watched him intently, searching for something that Brian didn’t understand. When he looked away, it was to point at a picture on the wall.</p>
<p>It was Dom’s father, Brian knew what he looked like although Dom hadn’t ever specifically pointed him out before. “That’s my dad, coming up on the pro stock car circuit.” There was pride in his voice but that pride turned to ash as he kept talking, “Last race of the season a guy named Kenny Linder came up the from the inside on the final turn, clipped his bumper and put him in the wall at 120.”</p>
<p>If fate was real, it was a cruel bitch. Brian would have been <em>thrilled</em> if his father had been taken out like that but Dom loved his father. He loved him so much and respected him and seemed to worship him. Dom loved his family first and then cars second. How fucking wrong that something he loved could ruin the one thing he loved better.</p>
<p>Brian didn’t say a word. This was Dom’s moment, not his.</p>
<p>And Dom wasn’t done yet.</p>
<p>“I watched my dad burn to death. I heard him scream. People who were there said he died before the tanks blew. They said it was me who was screaming.”</p>
<p>Brian stayed still as Dom took a slow circuit around the car. “I saw Linder about a week later. I had a wrench. I hit him and I didn’t intend to keep hitting him but by the time I was done I couldn’t lift my arm. He’s a janitor at a high school. He has to take the bus to work every day. They banned me from the tracks for life. For so long, I lived my life a quarter mile at a time. Like I told you at the beginning, it was the only time I got to feel free. I thought ten seconds of freedom was all there was ever going to be for me.” Dom’s eyes finally met his again, “And then I got a call about you.”</p>
<p>Brian was silent for a second. Dom’s eyes stared at him in a way that they never had before. Always intense, always seeing more than Brian wanted him to… but this was almost like Dom was <em>afraid</em> of Brian. They had always been <em>Dom the jailer, Brian ready to run. </em>Except maybe now, a little more each day, they <em>weren’t?</em></p>
<p>And Dom, who watched him so carefully and heard his confession about wanting to race his Supra for his birthday, knew it.</p>
<p>It was like Leon said – Dom had been following Brian’s lead this whole time. It was maybe only now that Brian was feeling the power of that.</p>
<p>The realization <em>hurt</em>…</p>
<p>Dom’s eyes reminded him of his mother’s. Not the color or even the shape. It was that old familiar fear. <em>I love you so much, you have the power to wreck me and I’d let you to keep you close. </em></p>
<p>“Why didn’t you tell me?” Brian asked quietly.</p>
<p>Dom just stared at him like the answer was obvious. Then his lips curled up in a painful mockery of a smile and he said, “And prove to you that I’m capable of being the monster you thought I was?”</p>
<p>“Anyone is capable of being a monster.” Brian answered evenly. For maybe the first time, he <em>cared</em> whether his words hurt. “You’re built and strong and focused and intense, I’ve always known you were capable of killing me if you wanted to.”</p>
<p>Dom shut his eyes.</p>
<p>Brian came closer. He wasn’t afraid. Not like before.</p>
<p>Putting his hand to Dom’s cheek felt like a massive step. Speaking felt like less of one, “You made a mistake and you paid for it.” Dom’s eyes opened and he stared at Brian with that same sort of wonder as after his nightmare. “You regret it. You made it because you were hurting. I don’t get to pretend I’ve never hit someone or wanted to hurt someone like you hurt the guy who accidentally killed your dad. Maybe it’s better you learned the price of losing control before me and my bullshit showed up.” He laughed even though he knew it wasn’t funny.</p>
<p>The joke fell as flat as he knew it would. Dom started to shake his head before he realized the movement might dislodge Brian’s hand against his skin, “I would never. I wouldn’t have ever, Brian, I…”</p>
<p>“I know.” Brian cut in gently, “I know, Dom.”</p>
<p>It was the truth.</p>
<p>“You got any other deep dark secrets you want to confess while we’re on the topic?”</p>
<p>“No.” Dom answered and Brian knew <em>that</em> was the truth too.</p>
<p>Without thought, Brian leaned in and kissed Dom. Just soft on the lips, no tongue, no major making out action. Dom seemed too stunned to really do anything but that was okay. Brian wasn’t sure why he had done it but it felt…</p>
<p>
  <em>Right?</em>
</p>
<p>Maybe right.</p>
<p>Nice, at least.</p>
<p>He stepped back from Dom’s space and left without another word. He was pretty sure they were both going to need a little space after the heavy revelation of the day.</p>
<p>So now he knew. Dom went to jail for assault.</p>
<p>Maybe he should have felt some sort of way about it. Maybe once he <em>would</em> have felt differently.</p>
<p>Maybe if Dom had told him, he would have been afraid. He wasn’t, not of Dom, not anymore.</p>
<p>He knew now that if Dom started throwing punches, if he picked up another wrench and used it the way he had once before, his violence wasn’t going to be for Brian. It wouldn’t be for Mia or Jesse or Leon or Letty or Vince.</p>
<p>Dom’s violence would be towards anyone who hurt them, just like it had been the first time.</p>
<p>He was glad he knew. He was glad he knew <em>now</em>.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>---</strong>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>He had practically needed to sign his name in blood for this.</p>
<p>
  <em>I, Brian O’Conner, hereby swear IN BLOOD to not overdo it, to drink water, to tell people when my head hurts, to take breaks, to not be a pissy little bitch about taking said breaks and to not give one Dominic Toretto any heart attacks while on the premises. </em>
</p>
<p>As he walked into the garage for the first time in way too long and got to see his baby again, his first thought was <em>worth it.</em></p>
<p>She was even more gorgeous than he remembered.</p>
<p>“Are you crying?” Letty asked loudly on purpose.</p>
<p>He pretended to wipe a tear away, “I don’t think I’ve ever seen anything so beautiful.”</p>
<p>Leaning into Letty’s jokes was key, he had discovered.</p>
<p>The second he got close enough to his car, he leaned over the hood with his arm spread wide in a hug, “They should have brought you to visit me in the hospital.”</p>
<p>That made everyone laugh, including Dom – which, considering how unhappy and tense he was about Brian coming back to the garage for ‘light duty’, was actually a minor miracle.</p>
<p>He straightened back up as a thought occurred to him, “Actually, I take that back. No one drives her before me.”</p>
<p>“We figured,” Vince laughed as he went over to a Toyota in the corner that looked like it had seen better decades.</p>
<p>The rest of the group dispersed, each going to what they were supposed to be working on for the day. Even Dom took a car, even though he usually did shit in the office first thing in the morning. That was to watch him, he knew. Hopefully he’d get bored with it soon.</p>
<p>Brian glanced around and decided Leon was going to be the lucky recipient of his assistance today.</p>
<p>Well…</p>
<p>He glanced at his car.</p>
<p>Leon could wait for ten minutes.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>---</strong>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Or twenty. Twenty was okay too.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>---</strong>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Somewhere along the way Brian kind of forgot about the check in calls from juvie.</p>
<p>Dom told him later that they were still calling every day but they had gotten the lowdown from Brian’s doctors that if he was sleeping to leave him be. They let Dom and Mia answer for him.</p>
<p>Now that it had been a while and Brian had gotten cleared at a follow-up appointment, there weren’t any more valid excuses.</p>
<p>He was pretty sure the bored woman on the other end of the line was as happy to hear his voice again as he was to hear hers. What a miserable fucking job. He almost pitied her.</p>
<p>“Toretto residence, this is Brian O’Conner,” Brian stated when he answered the phone during breakfast. He tried to chop this thing down as much as possible.</p>
<p>The woman gave her title and reason for calling almost mindlessly before getting to the <em>juicy</em> stuff.  “How are your injuries healing?”</p>
<p>“Great,” Brian answered, “Barely any headaches anymore.”</p>
<p>“Has your Mark forwarded the doctor’s report to our office?”</p>
<p>“Yesterday.”</p>
<p>“Do you have any concerns to report?”</p>
<p><em>Yes, I hate the sound of your voice and I might vomit if I have to keep talking to you. </em>“No concerns.”</p>
<p>“Your father called our office quite worried about your recent injuries and the situation that you received them in. He would like to set up visitation.”</p>
<p>“You have to be kidding me.” The words fell out before Brian could even stop them. “He never gave a damn when he was the one causing the concussions so why should he start now?”</p>
<p>“Brian?”</p>
<p>Dom’s voice barely made a dent in his growing rage. How dare his father pretend like he gave a damn about Brian? After everything that man had done, after all the years he showed no mercy or kindness or even a sense of responsibility towards him, why would he ever think that he could play these games now?</p>
<p>“Mr. O’Conner, your father…”</p>
<p>He cut her off. He was <em>done</em> with this conversation. “Tell him to go fuck himself.”</p>
<p>Without another word, he shoved the phone at Dom and went out to the back porch. He couldn’t stand there and listen to another second of it and he wanted to see their faces even less. If he caught an ounce of pity in their eyes, he wouldn’t be able to keep his cool and they didn’t deserve this.</p>
<p>All this anger barely contained inside of him belonged to his father.</p>
<p>The backdoor opened a couple of minutes later.</p>
<p>“I told her no again.” Dom said quietly as he came around to sit beside Brian on the bench. “He doesn’t get to override me.”</p>
<p>“But he does get to override <em>me</em>.” Brian spit out bitterly.</p>
<p>Dom sighed heavily but his words were more encouraging, “Soon he won’t. Soon you’ll be eighteen and you get to decide. I’ll handle it until then.”</p>
<p>That was true.</p>
<p>It was true about a lot of people.</p>
<p>His eighteenth birthday loomed over both of their heads, even if Brian had gotten less panicked about it. That had mostly been down to him having plenty of time to figure it out and it was still true – there were a little over three months until his birthday – but everyday it got less.</p>
<p>He had a lot of things to figure out still.</p>
<p>And fuck if he knew how to solve any of it.</p>
<p> </p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>We're in the home stretch now! I can't believe how close we are to the end! Don't worry, I still have a few more twists coming up for you ;) </p>
<p>Please let me know what you thought of the chapter!</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0015"><h2>15. Chapter Fifteen</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <hr/>
<p>
  <strong>Chapter Fifteen </strong>
</p>
<hr/>
<p> </p>
<p>It wasn’t until Mia started talking about <em>Dom’s</em> birthday at dinner one night that Brian sort of remembered that he had other birthdays to worry about.</p>
<p>So far, they had celebrated Vince’s birthday (Brian’s present to him had been a carton of orange juice and five minutes in the backyard to try and nail him with some – Vince had been gleeful and Brian had gotten a little wet but not <em>entire carton of juice </em>wet and that was really all that mattered) and Jesse’s (they had arranged an all day tournament of that video game that even Brian was sick of by then and ate truly nasty junk food the whole time).</p>
<p>He knew Letty’s birthday was about a month before his mostly because she had endless demands for the party and the presents and the food and probably the size of the throne they were supposed to build her.</p>
<p>Dom’s birthday hadn’t come up and Brian had been so worried about <em>his</em> he hadn’t really thought about it.</p>
<p>And now he had to <em>what?</em> Come up with a present? What a fucking minefield.</p>
<p>Asking was easier, he was pretty sure. There was a chance that Dom was going to say something sappy and ridiculous like <em>you’re my present this year</em> like that creepy incest coffee commercial but there was also a chance that he might just answer.</p>
<p>He waited until they were alone. He was <em>not </em>getting heckled by Letty or Vince about this.</p>
<p>Alone turned out to be while Brian was drying the dishes and Dom came in to grab a drink from the fridge.</p>
<p>“So what am I getting you for your birthday?” Brian asked as casually as he could.</p>
<p>Dom stopped for a second, just standing there in front of the open fridge before he seemed to restart his brain and grab the Corona.</p>
<p>“Whatever you want.” Dom said as he shut the fridge.</p>
<p>Brian shot a glare, “Don’t be obnoxious. Pick something or I’ll buy you a carton of OJ and blackmail Vince into running in the yard for five minutes.”</p>
<p>Dom laughed, “I wouldn’t be mad at that but throwing juice is really your special thing with him. Wouldn’t want to cut in on it.”</p>
<p>“So…?” Brian drew the word out obnoxiously.</p>
<p>The smile on Dom’s face changed while he stared at him. Got softer, less amused. “I want you to let me take you on a date. One date and you can’t freak out.”</p>
<p>Brian carefully kept his expression unchanging, “That doesn’t sound like much of a present.”</p>
<p>There was silence for a second, “Doesn’t have to be that. You could promise me the first ride in your baby, that’d be a good present too.”</p>
<p>Brian forced himself to laugh, “We might have a winner.”</p>
<p>Dom just smiled at him like his second choice was totally fine and that just cemented it for Brian.</p>
<p>He had some planning to do.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>---</strong>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>The next morning, Brian purposefully got in the car with Leon after breakfast.</p>
<p>“I need your help.” He said, which in retrospect the way he said it and the way his voice had sounded had probably made it sound less like <em>help me get clothes </em>and more like <em>help me hide a body</em>.</p>
<p>Leon was pretty unflappable though and that was one of the things Brian liked best about him. It was also why he had chosen him for this request and not the others.</p>
<p>Mia: She’d help but she’d gush about it. Think it was cute. Get all girly.</p>
<p>Vince: His help would be useless and he’d lord it over Brian. He’d be willing, he was Dom’s best friend after all, but that’d be about it.</p>
<p>Letty: No fucking way.</p>
<p>Jesse: He’d spill the beans by accident inside of an hour</p>
<p>So that left Leon.</p>
<p>“Sure, what do you need?” Leon asked with a laugh like Brian potentially needing help covering up a murder was amusing to him.</p>
<p>“Clothes,” Brian answered as though wild horses were dragging the words out of him, “Like date clothes.”</p>
<p>All he had were jeans and t-shirts. That was fine, those were all he wanted, but Brian knew enough about Dom to know he was going to want to take him on a <em>real</em> date if he was getting the chance. What Brian had looked just about good enough for a chain seafood restaurant and not much else. That wasn’t Dominic Toretto <em>at all</em>.</p>
<p>Leon nodded like that wasn’t a weird request. “I can do that. You want to go with me to try stuff on or you want me to get your sizes and pick out an outfit?”</p>
<p>Both options sounded like shit, “I don’t think we can hide us going out somewhere secret and not have someone notice.”</p>
<p>“This a surprise?” Leon asked.</p>
<p>“Yeah,” Brian said shortly. <em>It’s a secret and don’t ask for details</em>. “So I think it would have to be you going and getting something. I don’t have any money but I can…”</p>
<p>Leon held up a hand, “Nah, man, don’t worry about it. Call this <em>your</em> birthday present early, if you like.”</p>
<p>Well, there went any chance that Leon didn’t know what this was about.</p>
<p>“You got an idea about what kind of clothes you want?” Leon asked when Brian just sputtered for a second.</p>
<p>He sighed because yes, he did…</p>
<p>Dom better fucking appreciate this.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>---</strong>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Eventually he had to clue in Mia.</p>
<p>He couldn’t really let her plan a whole elaborate birthday dinner, could he? He waited until the last possible minute, a couple of days before Dom’s birthday. He figured he would let <em>her</em> work out how to tell the rest of the team and get them to keep their mouths shut.</p>
<p>When he explained, she stared at him with wide eyes and lips pressed together hard to keep herself from smiling.</p>
<p>“Jesus, just get it out of your system.” He finally said when it got obvious she wasn’t going to be able to speak until she got a few seconds to gush.</p>
<p>The sound that came out of Mia’s still tightly shut mouth was not human. She sounded like a wounded parakeet more than anything and her shaking her head while she did it only made it sound weirder.</p>
<p>“Okay…” Brian said slowly because he wasn’t going to touch whatever that had been, “So I was thinking, you could do a big breakfast thing instead? Tell everyone to bring presents and that kind of thing early so he wakes up and gets to do the family stuff? I don’t want to take you guys celebrating away from anyone but I’d also rather do this on his actual birthday.”</p>
<p>“Sure!” Mia squeaked.</p>
<p>Brian glared, “Could you please pull yourself together?”</p>
<p>To her credit, she shook her head.</p>
<p>At least she was honest.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>---</strong>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Dom’s breakfast went great.</p>
<p>Everyone showed up half an hour early with only minimal grumbling. Dom came downstairs to an almost ridiculous spread from Mia with an assist from Brian that spanned breakfast foods, desserts and even baby back ribs. There were Coronas and coffee. The team seemed to have a thing for picking out weird as fuck presents for each other and they all delivered on that. Brian was almost afraid for his birthday, although Jesse gave Dom plans for a car that looked <em>sick</em> so if that happened for him then he would probably cry.</p>
<p>Brian presented Dom with a coupon good for the first ride in his baby after his birthday and the rest of them played it up. They acted like Brian had given Dom the key to goddamn city or some shit. By now they all (aside from Jesse, not even Mia deemed him safe to tell) knew what the real present was so he knew they were doing all of their theatrics on purpose to throw Dom off the scent.</p>
<p>When Brian had given him the coupon, he’d been a little worried that Dom would be disappointed or something. He didn’t want to start the guy’s birthday off on the wrong foot just to surprise him later.</p>
<p>Dom had only smiled at him so wide it made him look like a different person.</p>
<p>The day went well, no one gave him away. They went to the garage and worked because Dom wasn’t seven. Letty teased him about getting old. Vince made sure to call him over for every tough or dirty job there was. Brian graciously let him sit in his baby for two minutes to give him something to tide him over.</p>
<p>Brian had expected the anxiety about this whole plan to grow and grow as they day went.</p>
<p>It hadn’t.</p>
<p>He wasn’t <em>excited</em> but he wasn’t not excited either. This felt like kissing Dom all over again. The step forward wasn’t welcome but it felt good while he was doing it.</p>
<p>When they got home, Mia told Dom they were going to dinner. He tried to tell her it was too much after his breakfast surprise but she insisted. She said <em>she</em> had a whole plan and he needed to follow it. A brother/sister birthday dinner.</p>
<p>He had an hour to get ready, according to her.</p>
<p>Brian had already left the two of them to it. He didn’t want to seem so interested either way.</p>
<p>Besides, he had to get ready too.</p>
<p>Leon, may the universe bless that chill bastard, had gotten him a pretty decent outfit. Black jeans that looked decently dressy but were kind of too tight. A dark blue button down shirt without a pattern (that was key, he had given specific instructions – he knew the kind of shit Leon wore) and a dark gray blazer.</p>
<p>He took a quick shower to get the sweat and motor oil off and made a half-hearted attempt to tame his curls. Dom knew what his hair looked like, he didn’t seem much point in slicking it back and making himself look weird.</p>
<p>Mia stayed away, which was good. She was <em>supposed</em> to be getting ready in her bedroom, so if she hovered around him she was only going to make things suspect. Besides, if she gushed at him it was going to feel too close to prom and even she had to realize how weird that would be.</p>
<p>He finished in 45 minutes. He wanted to be waiting for Dom at the door. The stairs were right there, so once Dom was at the top of them he would see Brian and know.</p>
<p>Waiting was kind of like torture.</p>
<p>Technically, he didn’t have any reason to be worried. His <em>date</em> was a sure thing. Dom wasn’t going to say no or stand him up. That eliminated stress right there. Dom had asked for this and it wasn’t like, at this point, he hated the guy’s company.  He was pretty sure they would have a good time.</p>
<p>But this was a <em>date</em>. It was <em>romantic</em>.</p>
<p>Fuck.</p>
<p>By the time he’d really worked himself up about it, the door to Dom’s bedroom opened and there was no turning back.</p>
<p>Brian stood at the bottom of the stairs and leaned against the wall, trying not to look like he was about to leap out of his own skin.</p>
<p>When Dom got to the stairs he went two steps down before he saw Brian, registered the outfit and froze.</p>
<p>“You better have a place picked out.” Brian joked a little weakly. “I organized the rest of this, I shouldn’t have to pick the restaurant.”</p>
<p>Dom stared at him.</p>
<p>Then a slow smile dawned, “Baby, I’ve had our first date planned for months.”</p>
<p>
  <em>Oh god, he was opening the night with a ‘baby’. </em>
</p>
<p>He wasn’t allowed to get weird though, that was in the fine print.</p>
<p>Dom came down the stairs like he was half a foot taller than he usually was. He looked <em>good</em>. Dark pants, dark shirt, brown leather jacket that had no business looking so stylish next to Brian’s sort of cobbled together outfit.</p>
<p>He started walking again, coming down the stairs and offering his arm to Brian, “You ready?”</p>
<p>Brian mentally sighed and slid his arm through Dom’s, studiously ignoring the way his biceps bulged.</p>
<p>Like seriously, what the hell?</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>---</strong>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>One thing Brian had been consoling himself with was that, considering Dom wasn’t getting any notice, there wasn’t going to be any chance of a fancy restaurant that required reservations.</p>
<p><em>Of course</em> Dom had a friend who owned a fucking <em>nice</em> restaurant who was aware of their situation and was willing to accommodate last minute. Like Dom had set this arrangement up with this guy for whenever he wore Brian down on the date thing.</p>
<p>The menus didn’t even have prices.</p>
<p>This shit was nervewracking.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>---</strong>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>The food was delicious. He’d say worth every penny but he wasn’t paying and he had no idea how many pennies it had cost. A lot, probably.</p>
<p>Better he didn’t know.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>---</strong>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“You’re not driving back to the house.” Brian said after dinner. It wasn’t a demand, it was an observation. This was definitely not the way… <em>home</em>.</p>
<p>Dom glanced at him, “I said I had a plan, didn’t I?”</p>
<p>“Didn’t know it was like, multi-step.” Brian shrugged off the fact that he had no idea where he was. Dom knew him decently well – he was pretty confident he wasn’t on his way to a hoedown or something.</p>
<p>There wasn’t an answer to that, which put them into silence. It wasn’t the silence itself that was noticeable, it was that it was the first long pause of the night. Brian hadn’t been on many dates in his life. He didn’t see the point and he didn’t have the energy for it. Between his passion – cars – and surviving his father, there wasn’t much emotion left for anything else. Rome got more of his attention than any potential boyfriend or girlfriend.</p>
<p>The point was, his reference pool was small.</p>
<p>Still, tonight had been really… nice?</p>
<p>Dom was still Dom but he was taking full advantage of Brian’s promise to let this be a date and not get weird. He was being <em>charming</em>. He was making jokes. He was touching Brian lightly, nothing huge but the little brushes of his fingertips were practically constant. He wasn’t holding back on smiling at him, or being attentive or looking at him like he hung the moon or some romantic shit like that.</p>
<p>It was weird.</p>
<p>It was good?</p>
<p>The contrast between this relaxed version of Dom and the semi-tense one who had circled around Brian watchfully every day since they’d met was huge.</p>
<p>They’d talked about everything. Nothing deep but no conversation stopped just because they’d hit a sore spot. Dom talked about his father as though he hadn’t just told Brian all about his death less than a week ago. He told him how he’d met Vince and Letty, about opening the garage and how tough it had been to take on the mantle of owner and boss, and about how proud he was of Mia.</p>
<p>Brian talked about the car ride that had landed him in juvie. Not in a sad weepy way – to him it wasn’t a sad weepy memory – but more like a newscaster narrating a high speed chase. He had Dom almost doubled over laughing and some lady at a table two over from them shot them a look while her wife tried to get her to stop it. He’d seen the nicer of the two mouth <em>young love</em>.</p>
<p>He didn’t let those words throw him into a tailspin but those red lips mouthing the words wouldn’t leave his head.</p>
<p>By the time the check came, Brian couldn’t even pretend that he was pretending. This wasn’t for Dom’s birthday anymore. This was because they were having a fun time. This was because Dom was hot and into him. It was maybe even because Brian was into Dom. A little. Kind of.</p>
<p>He’d sort of been disappointed that it was over.</p>
<p>Except apparently it wasn’t. Apparently there was another part to this date Dom had dreamt up.</p>
<p>“Do I get a hint?” Brian finally asked, just to be an ass.</p>
<p>Dom laughed, “Impatient. We’ll be there in like two minutes.”</p>
<p>“So… you’re not going to give me a hint?”</p>
<p>“So fucking impatient,” Dom said fondly. Like Brian was cute or something.</p>
<p>Cute was <em>never</em> what he had aimed for in his life.</p>
<p>A brightly lit storefront with people in a line that snaked down the street caught his eye. There was a huge neon ice cream cone outside it, almost obnoxiously big.</p>
<p>Dom noticed his eye catch on it, “This was where my parents always took Mia and I for ice cream. They went there on their first date. Family tradition.”</p>
<p>Those words in this moment was the first bit of hesitance Dom had shown. Brian knew why – family and tradition and his parents’ love – but for the first time ever those thoughts didn’t bother him. Dom was sharing something with him that was small but huge. And it involved food.</p>
<p>“They have good hot fudge?”</p>
<p>He wasn’t Dom. Brian would never want to talk things out like Dom did. Yeah, he couldn’t pretend that sometimes it helped, but he liked actions vs words. Dom did that well too but he seemed obsessed with having as many ways of communicating as possible.</p>
<p>It was easier to just answer these kinds of moments with acceptance like this. Dom wanted to continue a family tradition with Brian. Okay, fine. For his part, Brian wasn’t sure how he felt about it but it wasn’t bad and he wasn’t angry. So, accept it and move on. Keep it from being some big moment between them. How’s the hot fudge?</p>
<p>“They got good hot fudge. Great ice cream.” Dom promised him. “Soft serve and the hard kind too.”</p>
<p>“Sold,” Brian said, “Although, it’s ice cream so they’d have to be some kind of weird for me to not be on board.”</p>
<p>Dom laughed, “They make their own flavors of the hard ice cream, sometimes they’re a little weird but I don’t think you’re picky enough to turn it down.”</p>
<p>He wasn’t. So long as they didn’t have like dog shit flavored ice cream, Brian was all in.</p>
<p>They pulled into a spot and the line still pretty long considering how late it was. Less little kids, more people like them. People on dates.</p>
<p>Jesus, this was still kind of weird.</p>
<p>Brian didn’t let that thought show. This was Dom’s present and he wasn’t allowed to freak out so he wasn’t going to. Pure and simple.</p>
<p>And easier said than done. He was just going to keep repeating that to himself anytime the weirdness cropped up.</p>
<p>“You weren’t kidding,” Brian said as they got to the back of the line and started reading a chalkboard listing out the flavors they had available. “Lavender honey?”</p>
<p>“Hipster shit.” Dom said quietly, “Mia likes it though.”</p>
<p>Mia had a little bit of an earth mother thing going, so that wasn’t surprising. “What’s your favorite?”</p>
<p>Dom tilted his head like Brian was asking him some serious shit. Although, favorite ice cream flavor <em>was</em> kind of serious so he appreciated Dom recognizing that. “Here? They’ve got a mean chocolate peanut butter. That might win. Though blackberry is a real close second.”</p>
<p>They took a few steps forward as the line moved, “I’m eyeing the s’mores one.” Brian said. “With hot fudge.”</p>
<p>“Whatever you want.” Dom promised.</p>
<p>Brian snorted, “Big spender.”</p>
<p>“It’s something I’m okay saying to you at an ice cream place. You can put away a lot, but I’m still pretty safe. Now, if we were at Harry’s or some other place lookin’ at parts… the tune would change.” Dom teased him.</p>
<p>That was probably wise on his part.</p>
<p>They reached the front of the line and ordered, the girl behind the register greeting Dom by name before she rang them up. It was too busy for them to shoot the shit, which spared Brian from having to be introduced.</p>
<p>When she passed them their ice creams, Brian just had to say thank you. That was way more his speed. They worked their way through the crowd to one of the few empty picnic benches.</p>
<p>“There a third phase you want to warn me about?” Brian asked as he started assembling the perfect first bite.  He carefully dug around to make sure he had the chocolate ice cream, marshmallow swirl, a chunk of graham cracker and some hot fudge on his spoon.</p>
<p>Dom watched him while he started in on his chocolate peanut butter cone. “Didn’t want to overwhelm you first time out the gate. After this we can go home.”</p>
<p>That news barely registered. The first taste of his ice cream was all Brian could think about. “Shit, that’s good,” He groaned.</p>
<p>Dom laughed, “Glad you approve.”</p>
<p>A sudden vision of their late night drives starting with this place came over him. Dom driving his freaked out ass here for some sugar before letting him loose on the open road.</p>
<p>If that happened, and Brian was pretty sure it would, this place wouldn’t just be a Toretto family tradition. It’d be a Dom and Brian tradition.</p>
<p>It would be weird.</p>
<p>He took another bite and had to hold back the moan.</p>
<p>But he’d be okay with it.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>---</strong>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Dom still reminded him to take it easy in the garage but that was about it. No more enforced resting, no more half days, no more babying. He was back in the groove of things, which was how he preferred it.</p>
<p>Between his self-imposed exile and his recovery, he’d really started to miss being here. Working on cars was like zen and being around the others was fun. Plus, he got to see the Supra every day.</p>
<p>An hour into them getting in, a muffler louder than a chainsaw started coming down their street. They couldn’t even see the car yet but they could hear it. Hell, people in San Francisco could probably hear the thing.</p>
<p>“Christ,” Letty said with a laugh, “Not it.”</p>
<p>She and Brian stood close together with their eyes on the garage bay, waiting to see what piece of godawful was coming their way. Jesse and Leon were towards the back, looking over something in a car that Leon had been working on for the better part of a week. The thing was trashed in about seventeen different ways and since he’d taken that one on, he was pretty much automatically <em>not it</em> either.</p>
<p>But Vince? Vince was in the office with Dom. Brian grinned, “I think we both know who’s it.”</p>
<p>Letty shot him a wicked look back, “Hell yeah.”</p>
<p>Finally, the car came into view. It looked late 90s and was painted that weird color that was like gray/tan. Brian got that not everyone wanted to paint their cars neon green but still, what the absolute fuck possessed any car company to pick that color?</p>
<p>The windows were tinted just enough that Brian couldn’t get a good look at the person inside. “Yo Leon!” He called, because he didn’t do the whole talking to customers thing. Letty <em>could</em> but well, she was Letty. Leon was the better choice. Jesse pulled up dead last. If it were just him and Brian in the garage (not that anyone ever let it be just him and Jesse) Brian would step up to the plate but that was the only reason.</p>
<p>He heard Leon’s voice drift closer, even though he was still talking to Jesse about something.</p>
<p>Brian turned away from the car pulling in to make sure Leon knew where this poor piece of shit was heading, “Letty and I made an executive call. This thing is Vince’s.”</p>
<p>Leon’s face did that thing where he wanted to scrunch it up in disgust but there was a customer close by so he had to keep it neutral. “That guy looks <em>pissed</em> too.” Then he called over, “Hello sir! How can we-”</p>
<p>
  <em>“Who the hell do you think you are, boy? Turning your back on me?” </em>
</p>
<p>Brian froze.</p>
<p>“You think going to fucking prison makes you too good to answer me when I tell you to?”</p>
<p>Leon’s eyes went wide and Brian could see even Letty freeze for a second.</p>
<p>This wasn’t some dumb asshole with a shit car.</p>
<p>It was his <em>father</em>.</p>
<p>He hadn’t heard his voice in over a year, except all the times it echoed in his ears screaming at him how he was worthless and cowardly and a piece of shit.</p>
<p>A hand grabbed his arm, gripping him so tight he knew there would be bruises if he didn’t let up. Brian knew what they would look like. He’d seen those fingerprints on his skin a hundred times before.</p>
<p>His father spun him around to face him and Brian let him. He felt sort of detached, like this was maybe just another nightmare. A new one, just for location and situation, but familiar as fuck.</p>
<p>Earl O’Conner’s face was flushed red. A mix of rage and alcohol, same as it always was. His shoe leather reddened skin had always made him look older than he was but seeing him now Brian’s first thought was at how bad his father looked. Old. Sick. Hopefully dying.</p>
<p>“Why are you here?” Brian hissed. “Why the fuck are you here?”</p>
<p>His father shoved him back but Brian surged forward the second he could, getting in his old man’s face.</p>
<p>“Get your hands off of him!” Letty barked at Earl. She looked ready to rage but Earl just laughed in her face.</p>
<p>“I thought they said your Mark was a man? He whoring you out to his employees or something?” His father asked like that was the grandest joke he had ever heard.</p>
<p>“Letty, go get Dom.” Leon said evenly. He didn’t take his eyes off of Earl, his exterior nothing but calm, “And you take your hands off of Brian.”</p>
<p>Earl had never, not a moment in Brian’s entire life and probably not before that either, took to being told what to do. Brian could have told them both not to bother. He would have, except the hand his father had clamped around his arm shoved him back just to yank him forward and down onto his knees. His shoulder didn’t appreciate it at all and Brian felt the joint threaten to give as he crashed down onto the ground in the middle of Letty’s swearing. Certainly wouldn’t be the first time that shoulder popped out of its socket.</p>
<p>“You don’t tell me what to do, scum.” Earl snarled at Leon from above Brian.</p>
<p>Then his boot came flying towards Brian, catching him in the hip and sending him to his back. The hit hurt so bad Brian’s vision went a little hazy but he was used to this. Used to all of it. He knew not to let himself go down, it wasn’t safe to go unaware.</p>
<p>Sure enough, his father lunged for Leon and it was only Brian grabbing hold of his leg that saved Leon from a black eye.</p>
<p>“Letty, go!” Leon demanded.</p>
<p>“You go with ‘er. None of this concerns you.” Earl shouted. “Get out of my face.”</p>
<p>Brian let his leg go, his hands felt like they were tingling just from having to touch him. He stood and glared, “You want me gone every day of my life, so I left. I’m gone. Why the fuck are you here?”</p>
<p>“You don’t tell me when I’m done with you, piece of shit! You belong to me. You both belong to me and you always will.” Earl shouted in his face. “Havin’ your Mark tell those people no when I say you show your face? Who the fuck do you think you are?”</p>
<p>He wasn’t getting his way, he felt like Brian was dismissing him. So here he was, proving to the both of them that Brian would never really get away. No matter what he did, he was stuck forever with Earl O’Conner screaming in his face. Brian had lost over a year of his life to juvie and Dom’s custody and none of it mattered.</p>
<p>“Letty, <em>go</em>!”</p>
<p>He was always going to be here again. Standing in front of a man who hated him too much to let him go, bruised up and <em>done</em>.</p>
<p>Letty was gone and when Leon reached for Earl again, Brian could see Jesse over his shoulder absolutely frozen. He knew Jesse did badly with people yelling – just another person Brian was dragging down with this inescapable shit.</p>
<p>Like a five year old who hadn’t learned the lesson yet, Brian focused more on Jesse than he did on his father just long enough for Earl to shove him again. When Brian went down this time, he fell right onto the hood of his car.</p>
<p><em>Fuck this</em>.</p>
<p>He had to <em>go</em>. There wasn’t any other option. He wasn’t going to stand here and get thrown around again. He wasn’t going to get screamed at. He wasn’t going to just <em>take it</em> like every other time before.</p>
<p>His heart was pounding. His legs were moving before he’d even thought it through all the way. The only thing that mattered was getting away from his father. The only way that was going to happen was if Brian left himself.</p>
<p>He could leave. He could always leave. No matter what his father said, <em>he could leave.</em></p>
<p>Brian practically tore the door open. The almost boneless relief he felt when he saw the keys sitting there on the passenger seat left over from the last time they’d turned on the engine to test it nearly sent him to his knees.</p>
<p><em>Get away from here</em>.</p>
<p>Brian slammed the door shut just and grabbed the keys while Leon and Earl grappled with each other. His father trying to get to Brian and Leon doing everything he could to keep him back.</p>
<p>The second Brian turned the keys in the ignition and his baby roared to life ready to save Brian’s sanity, Leon started shouting. What he was saying, Brian wasn’t sure. It didn’t matter. Nothing mattered but getting the fuck away from his father. Never in his life had Brian <em>really</em> been able to save himself.</p>
<p>The tires spun when he hit the gas but Brian had built this thing to race. It was made for this moment.</p>
<p>This entire thing, from the minute his father had come out of his own shit car to this second, had been about four minutes. Less maybe.</p>
<p>In ten seconds, Brian was gone.</p>
<p>He turned out of the driveway laughing, his father in his dust.</p>
<p>
  <em>Run. Go as fast as you can. As far as you can. Get away. </em>
</p>
<p>This should have felt amazing. Driving his baby for the first time ever. Being alone in a car for the first time in so long. There wasn’t any of that. It was just the desperate need to get away. His hands were shaking, adrenalin coursing.</p>
<p>Nothing else mattered.</p>
<p>Nothing.</p>
<p>The tires squealed as Brian took a corner too tight. No chance could his father’s car catch up.</p>
<p><em>Run</em>.</p>
<p>Brian tried to tell himself that – that his father was in his dust and couldn’t catch up. That he was safe now. His head knew it but there was some pathetic little part of him, the same one that had hid while his mother bled to protect him, that didn’t listen. <em>Couldn’t</em> listen, maybe.</p>
<p>
  <em>Get away. Protect yourself. No one else was going to do it for you. Run. </em>
</p>
<p>Behind him, sirens blared.</p>
<p>Sirens.</p>
<p>
  <em>Cops. </em>
</p>
<p>Reality crashed into him so hard that his grip on the wheel faltered and he nearly crashed his car into a barrier.</p>
<p><em>Fuck</em>.</p>
<p>No driving. That was the condition. Don’t drive.</p>
<p>And here he was, broad fucking daylight, driving to save his life.</p>
<p>Brian slowed down. He felt like he was crashing down from the place he had been only a second ago. All that fear hemorrhaged out.</p>
<p>
  <em>Breathe. None of this matters. </em>
</p>
<p>By the time he stopped the car, he felt calm again.</p>
<p>His father wouldn’t ever visit him in juvie. They both knew it.</p>
<p>He went in once gratefully just for that reason.</p>
<p>The next few minutes passed in a blur. The cop asking for identification. Brian having none. Giving his name so they could look him up. Cars came speeding up behind the cops but no one was allowed near him. The cop talking to him was almost kind. He asked if Brian knew he was violating the terms of his release. Brian didn’t bother to deny it or explain.</p>
<p>“Your Mark is here.” The officer said, “He wants to talk to you.”</p>
<p>“I’m going back, aren’t I?” Brian asked hollowly.</p>
<p>The cop stared for a second, “You can have a minute to talk to him, if you want.”</p>
<p>“We should get going. We need cuffs?”</p>
<p>There was another pause. It sounded maybe like someone was calling his name.</p>
<p>He was tired.</p>
<p>“I don’t think we need cuffs.” The cop said finally.</p>
<p>The guy didn’t even bother to do that hand on the head thing to get Brian in the car. It didn’t matter. None of this shit mattered.</p>
<p>The door closed and it muffled some of the sound. The cop didn’t get in too and Brian felt a weird sort of restlessness grow. They needed to <em>go</em>. He still needed to run.</p>
<p>
  <em>“Brian!”</em>
</p>
<p>It was Dom’s voice.</p>
<p>One word wasn’t enough to <em>know</em>. How pissed was Dom? How angry was he that he’d blown all these months on his pathetic Mark only to get to watch him drive off to the same place Dom thought he had been saving him from? How much did Dom regret it?</p>
<p>Coward that he was, he didn’t turn around. He didn’t want to see it.</p>
<p>The cop finally got in the car and his partner joined them.</p>
<p>“You okay, Brian?” He asked quietly.</p>
<p>Brian nodded.</p>
<p>Nobody said anything else as they started driving.</p>
<p> </p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>We all knew Brian's father was going to show up... so of course I couldn't make it go the obvious way. Gotta keep it interesting! After all, he's always been Brian ready to run ;) </p>
<p>I'm very excited to see what everyone thinks! </p>
<p>(And no, this isn't the last twist I have for everyone!)</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0016"><h2>16. Chapter Sixteen</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <hr/>
<p>
  <strong>Chapter Sixteen </strong>
</p><hr/>
<p> </p>
<p>There wasn’t a trial.</p>
<p>There didn’t need to be. He’d gotten one of those at the start, when the judge chose to send him to juvie in the first place.</p>
<p>He violated the terms of his release - go directly to jail, do not pass go, do not collect $200.</p>
<p>Getting rebooked into the place felt surreal. Brian didn’t speak. He didn’t know what to say. His whole body was trembling to the point they made him stop at the Infirmary first. He wasn’t sure if it was leftover adrenalin from seeing his father or seeing the cop flashing his lights behind him. And yeah, he had a few bruises from his father but none of that was worth the way he was shaking. He didn’t know <em>what</em> it was.</p>
<p>The doctor called it shock.</p>
<p>While they put him under some scratchy blankets, one of the admin came to give him the rundown. Same as before, nothing new…</p>
<p>Except no visitation with Dom and the team.</p>
<p>He listened to those words hollowly. In the beginning, Dom had apparently had to fill out a form that said the names of the people that he <em>might</em> leave Brian with. He and Mia were listed as his guardians, Dom primary, but apparently he’d done some authorization thing that said not to freak out if they caught Brian alone with Leon or something. They were all on there, Vince right on through Jesse. One of the aunts that Brian had met on the cookout was even on the bottom of the list, like an emergency <em>emergency</em> contact.</p>
<p>So now none of them were allowed to see him.</p>
<p>The only person who <em>could</em> come was Rome and Brian had long since made him promise not to.</p>
<p>The admin said weirdly worded sentences that sort of half blamed them for Brian breaking the law again and that was why they couldn’t come but Brian didn’t buy it.</p>
<p>Punishment on punishment, that was all.</p>
<p>The admin had also told him that Dom had been forwarding testimony and video evidence about his father and the “assault” – which was a weird word for what was honestly a pretty tame outburst if Brian took history into account.</p>
<p>They said they understood there were extenuating circumstances. They said there would be no further punishment for what he had done.</p>
<p>But those circumstances didn’t change anything.</p>
<p>There wasn’t an ‘unless he has a really good reason’ clause in his release rules.</p>
<p>It was weird Dom was even trying.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>---</strong>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>It was harder to sink back into the dead-eyed guy from the beginning.</p>
<p>Not because he had forgotten how.</p>
<p>It was because the other guys had finally found his sore spot. Go ahead and talk about his dead mother. Talk about his shit father. Talk about how he got caught. Call him pretty and leer at him.</p>
<p>None of that shit mattered.</p>
<p>No one had ever really committed to bothering him for long. Brian was good at ignoring them and good at fighting back if the issue got forced. He didn’t play so no one pursued it long.</p>
<p>Now?</p>
<p>Now he was here because he’d thrown away the chance any of them would kill for.</p>
<p>He didn’t know how they knew, just that they did. They sneered about his Mark all the fucking time. They said shit about Dom they would never have the balls to say to his face. They spit on Brian for coming back here.</p>
<p>They hated him.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>---</strong>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Maybe he hated himself too.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>---</strong>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>He couldn’t help but turn it over in his mind again and again. Seeing his father, needing to run, getting in the car and taking off, each second replayed in his head all fucking day. Nights were the worst, he couldn’t even pretend and push it into the back of his mind.</p>
<p>Somewhere along the way, Brian had gone from a little kid afraid of his father but wanting so desperately to be loved by him and had grown into someone who (damn him) was afraid but was filled with such spitting hatred it almost scared him. He hated his father. There was nothing positive left.</p>
<p>It was blinding and stupid, he knew that. It made him careless and sloppy and hot headed in a way that he wasn’t ever. Some of the guys in here called him the Snowman he was so cool and calm. He hated what hating his father made him.</p>
<p>That burning hatred had fogged over his eyes and made him stupid. The second he’d seen his old man, he’d been angry. Then that same old fear came roaring back. The little flinch he wished he didn’t have ingrained so deep down inside of him. He knew what that man’s fist felt like. He knew how hard he could kick. He knew what those hands felt like wrapped around his arms right before he got thrown across the room. All of them together seemed to ghost over his whole body in that first split second when Brian had registered who was getting out of the car.</p>
<p>And that fear made him even angrier.</p>
<p>He wasn’t a child anymore. Earl O’Conner had no control over him. Fuck, he was not even two full months out from turning eighteen. After that, Brian owned himself.</p>
<p>Didn’t matter, apparently. Wasn’t ever going to matter. That flinch wasn’t going to magically go away when he hit that invisible line between childhood and adulthood.</p>
<p>And by being so afraid and so angry, he’d let his father win <em>again</em>.</p>
<p>Brian was in here because <em>he’d</em> lost control. Because he had run away.</p>
<p>What was he supposed to have fucking done though? Stayed? Gotten into some big fight with his old man in front of the team?</p>
<p>It was the same as before. Before Dom, before getting out. Before coming back.</p>
<p>If he had to sit in this place to be away from his father then so be it.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>---</strong>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Of course it was a fucking tuna sandwich that got him.</p>
<p>All the meals were either flavorless or gross enough that he wished they were flavorless. There were a couple of decent things but they got spaced out like treats. Slop for seven days then suddenly the mac and cheese that some glorious asshole had managed to sneak the recipe for into rotation with the rest of the government sponsored nastiness. Otherwise, it was all shit.</p>
<p>Brian didn’t really care. It was food. He wasn’t picky. Not even months of Mia’s cooking could change him enough to have him turning up his nose at an edible meal.</p>
<p>Or so he’d thought.</p>
<p>It wasn’t even that the tuna was that disgusting. The bread was stale and they used too much mayo. Not great but nothing worth puking over.</p>
<p>It was more the sandwich itself. Having tuna at all.</p>
<p>Never once in Brian’s entire life had been homesick. Not <em>once</em>.</p>
<p>He’d never really felt like he had a home. How could he when his parents turned the places they lived into warzones?</p>
<p>When had that changed?</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>---</strong>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>He thought about it for hours. Homes and missing them.</p>
<p>When the usual replay of that morning in the garage started back up in Brian’s fucked up brain, he welcomed it.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>---</strong>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>It wasn’t until two weeks in that he regretted not turning around to look at Dom in the squad car.</p>
<p>The constant loop always froze there, in that moment where he decided not to look.</p>
<p>If he had turned around, would he have seen Dom realizing that Brian was too fucked up to bother with anymore? Would he have seen the disappointment?</p>
<p>The homesickness wasn’t going away. He’d already realized that it was more <em>team </em>sickness than anything else. Yeah, he missed his bed. This hard bunk didn’t compare. And yeah, he missed a bathroom that he could close the door to and have some privacy. He didn’t deny it.</p>
<p>Those things weren’t big though. Brian didn’t <em>need</em> anything really.</p>
<p>It was talking and bitching with Mia that he missed. It was trading looks with Leon or marveling at Jesse’s brilliance. It was listening to Letty’s stories about the men she picked up and spat back out. Hell, it was even throwing shit at Vince.</p>
<p>He missed breakfast with them. He missed hearing Letty and Vince snipe at each other. He missed things he hadn’t even noticed he had gotten used to.</p>
<p>Missing them made it hard to ignore Dom.</p>
<p>Other than torturing himself with wondering about how Dom had reacted to Brian’s fuck up, Brian tried not to think about him. There <em>wasn’t</em> anything to think about. Dom wasn’t here. He couldn’t focus on it.</p>
<p>Brian turned again his bunk and prayed the guy below had fallen asleep. There were only so many shifts he was allowed to make in a night. Tossing and turning in a wiggly bunk bed was almost a mortal sin here.</p>
<p>He pushed away any thought of Dom as firmly as he could. The rest of them too. They weren’t here. They didn’t matter.</p>
<p>When Brian closed his eyes, he was in the garage again.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>---</strong>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>The phrase “Hey, pretty boy!” getting shouted at him barely registered anymore.</p>
<p>He didn’t turn around, acknowledging it didn’t do him any favors.</p>
<p>“Don’t be like that, baby!” There were cheers around this dude, like he was doing a fucking stand up routine or something. “I got something to cheer you up. Bigger than your Mark’s, I bet. That why you’re back here with us? His dick not good enough for you?”</p>
<p>Jesus, someone had really gotten the details out about his situation, hadn’t they? They even knew his Mark was a guy?</p>
<p>Brian hadn’t seen McConnell anywhere yet but this sort of screamed his doing. He could totally see the guy spreading Brian’s story around like some sort of inspirational fairy tale or something.</p>
<p>Fucking asshole.</p>
<p>“I’ll give you what you need, com’ere!”</p>
<p>Brian walked away.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>---</strong>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Hitting the one month mark until his eighteenth birthday felt surreal.</p>
<p>It wasn’t just because of this last year or so since he had been sentenced to juvenile detention until he turned eighteen. It wasn’t even just because of Dom and him having custody of Brian until that date either.</p>
<p>It was everyone and everything that had been holding him down and telling him what to do. It was the date that no one had any claim to him anymore. The United States government, maybe, but that was about it. He didn’t think they had a personal interest in what he did on a day to day basis as long as he wasn’t holding lots of money back from them or murdering people. He could operate within those guidelines just fine.</p>
<p>The idea of not belonging to anyone felt liberating.</p>
<p>And false.</p>
<p>He laid in his bunk and stared down at his Mark. It seemed like some fucked up version of poetic justice that it looked like a car going fast. Brian stealing a car set the wheels in motion for them to meet. They connected through driving fast late at night. They cemented that putting together the Supra.</p>
<p>And Brian ripped them apart by driving that car too fast in broad daylight.</p>
<p>It felt weird that he had been with Dom all those months and he hadn’t ever asked what Dom thought the Mark looked like. Did he think it was a car speeding through fog?</p>
<p>He felt like a hypocrite for even thinking that thought. That it was weird he hadn’t talked to Dom about it when it had been one hundred percent his own choice. Dom probably would have been willing to spend a full twenty four hours rhapsodizing about the thing. Brian was the one who wouldn’t. Hell, Brian was the one who wouldn’t even look at it.</p>
<p>Who the fuck was he to wonder about it <em>now</em>?</p>
<p>Now, when he wasn’t even allowed to talk to Dom. When he’d fucked up bad enough to get thrown back in this place with shit food and shit people and shit mattresses.</p>
<p>Without the team.</p>
<p>Brian had thought that he’d already had the worst loss he could ever feel so he would never really miss anything again. Never really <em>need</em> anything that he would ache for in its absence.</p>
<p>Now, laying here in the low light wide awake listening to the chorus of whispers and snores around him while still feeling so incredibly alone, he was finding he’d been wrong.</p>
<p>These ugly gray walls didn’t bother him. This bed didn’t really bother him either. Not even the bars keeping him in.</p>
<p>He could deal with it.</p>
<p>He missed <em>them</em>.</p>
<p>No part of him had expected it and absolutely no part of him welcomed the realization.</p>
<p>For the first time, Brian wondered what they thought about what had happened. He sort of ached for Jesse, because he already knew what <em>he</em> must be feeling. <em>Guilty</em>. Jesse had stood there frozen the entire time. When Leon yelled for Letty to go get Dom, Jesse could have gone just as easily.</p>
<p>Hopefully, someone had talked to him about it. Someone had to have told Jesse that Brian wouldn’t blame him. He <em>didn’t</em>.</p>
<p>Letty was probably angry. Angry at him, at his father, at the cops who had arrested him, at Leon and Dom and even probably Vince. Jesse and Mia were probably the only people who she wasn’t annoyed with.</p>
<p>Brian was seriously hoping that his father hadn’t done any actual damage to Leon. In his head, he kept getting dogged by the thought that Leon would be pissed to have had to take a hit that was Brian’s fault but Leon was too chill for that. Or at least, that was what he kept telling himself.</p>
<p>Mia had to be upset. There wasn’t any way she wasn’t.</p>
<p>Vince was harder to predict. On the one hand, he was a hothead who got pissed at Brian easily. On the other, he seemed like he ultimately just wanted Dom to be happy and they both knew Brian was a big piece of that puzzle.</p>
<p>Although, maybe that just meant that Vince was even more pissed at him. Pissed at him for running and getting arrested, that was.</p>
<p>Dom was the last one.</p>
<p>If Brian had turned around and looked at him, he wouldn’t need to wonder – he’d know.</p>
<p>It was only now that he was forcing himself to think about them that he really <em>wanted</em> to know. It had all happened so fast.</p>
<p><em>It had all happened so fast</em>… Brian glanced down at his Mark again.</p>
<p>How fast must Dom have driven to catch up with him? He had been only moments behind Brian.</p>
<p>Another speeding car racing through the fog to define them.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>---</strong>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“How fucked up you gotta be to come back here when you got to leave with your Mark?” Sergio growled in Brian’s face in the yard.</p>
<p>Brian look at him through eyes squinting in the sun, “Pretty fucked up.” He answered agreeably.</p>
<p>Sergio had been busting his ass for days. The quiet stare thing wasn’t doing anything to get him off Brian’s back so he moved on to this new plan. Cool and quiet, but speaking. No matter what this dude said, he wasn’t going to ruffle any of Brian’s feathers.</p>
<p>It was weird that he was even bothering Brian. Sergio had been there before Brian had left and they’d been, well, not <em>friends</em> because Brian had exactly one friend and that was Rome (sort of). They’d been quietly respectful of each other, he guessed was the way to explain it. Sergio was quiet like him. Built like a short tank with arms that reminded Brian of Dom’s but quiet all the same.</p>
<p>Was it a body type thing? This reverence to Marks personality trait thing, he meant.</p>
<p>“Fucking disgusting,” Sergio leaned in even closer.</p>
<p>Brian pointedly leaned back, “You gonna kiss me or something? Didn’t you hear? I’m spoken for.”</p>
<p>Humor helped, right?</p>
<p>Wrong.</p>
<p>Sergio <em>did not</em> think that was funny. He shoved Brian so hard keeping on his feet was a challenge. He had to stagger back a few steps but he managed it and that was all that mattered.</p>
<p>“I’m sure he’d be touched you care so much about it but you’re not him and I’m not yours so what the fuck is your concern man?” Brian did his best to keep any irritation out of his voice.</p>
<p>Sergio came into Brian’s space and even though he was shorter, his intensity made up the difference. There was barely an inch between them and Brian could feel the way Sergio was sort of trembling. Not in a scared way. In a fine vibration of rage kind of way.</p>
<p><em>Oh</em>, Brian realized way too slowly – he was actually really upset.</p>
<p>“You know what I would do to find my Mark? To get out of here to be with them? I was <em>happy</em> for you. You got to live the dream I would do anything for.” Sergio hissed at him. “But here you are again, because <em>you</em> fucked it up?”</p>
<p>“You don’t know anything,” Brian did his best to keep his voice level.</p>
<p>Sergio shook his head, “You’re pathetic. How could you throw that away? Why’d you get lucky if you were going to be so careless?”</p>
<p>“You don’t know anything.” Brian said again.</p>
<p>“You get scared? Too messed up to love anyone? What? What’s the reason? Daddy issues? Wha-”</p>
<p>Brian shoved him back, “<em>You don’t know anything.</em>”</p>
<p>That was a mistake he’d just made and he knew it but his chest was heaving he was breathing so hard and so angry, he couldn’t help it.</p>
<p>Sergio went exactly one step back before pulling his fist back and throwing the first punch.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>---</strong>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>His eye was going to swell shut, he knew it.</p>
<p>Sergio was on the other side of the Infirmary getting his nose reset or at least that was hopefully what they were doing. He definitely needed it.</p>
<p>Brian didn’t start fights here, none of them were worth it, but for his own safety he couldn’t just lay there and be an easy target. So Sergio was going to be breathing through his mouth for a while. It was his own fault anyway.</p>
<p>Just because he had respected the guy before this didn’t mean that Brian wasn’t going to defend himself. He had no one else.</p>
<p>Nobody on this planet was going to fight his battles for him.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>---</strong>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Later, in the dark, that thought echoed in his head.</p>
<p>
  <em>Nobody on this planet was going to fight his battles for him.</em>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>---</strong>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>When he let the garage play in his head again, he got caught up in a part he hadn’t really stopped to think about before.</p>
<p>Letty, finally doing what Leon said and running for Dom.</p>
<p>
  <em>Nobody on this planet was going to fight his battles for him. </em>
</p>
<p>Except one man had promised to. All those months ago, before Brian had even liked him. That morning in the bathroom when Brian had to decide who was his worst nightmare. His father or his Mark.</p>
<p>Dom had promised him that he would never let Brian’s father come near him. And he had followed through with that. He hadn’t ever used it against him. Time and time again, when his old man demanded to see him, Dom said no.</p>
<p>The truth hit him in the face.</p>
<p>If he had stayed still for a moment, Dom would have come running. He could have let Dom handle it for him. Dom would have made his father leave.</p>
<p>If Brian had trusted him, he wouldn’t be here.</p>
<p> </p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>A lot of you have been asking about a sequel so I thought I would talk about it in a chapter note. I take a long time to write things which is why all my stories are essentially complete before they get posted. I don't ever want to make you guys wait months for a chapter or something. </p>
<p>That said, I'm not adverse to writing a sequel to this. I like playing in this little universe I've created. I don't make any promises but if I were to write a sequel, what sorts of plot points would you guys like to see in it? Throw whatever you're thinking my way, big overarching plots or little tidbits you'd love to see incorporated, and we'll see if I can get any juices flowing. I do have an idea or two but I'd still love to get everyone's thoughts. </p>
<p>I  know you guys don't know how the story ends yet so feel free to wait to suggest something until the end or comment twice or shoot them off as they come to you or whatever you like really. Obviously I can't promise all the ideas would make it into a story (or even that a story would come) but I would try to get the vibe right at least ;) </p>
<p>You've all been so generous and awesome and supportive and I can't thank you enough!</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0017"><h2>17. Chapter Seventeen</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <hr/>
<p>
  <strong>Chapter Seventeen </strong>
</p>
<hr/>
<p>
  
</p>
<p>
  <em>Earl O’Conner’s face was flushed red. A mix of rage and alcohol, same as it always was. </em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>“Why are you here? Why the fuck are you here?” Why now? Why when Brian had finally started believing that he might never see his father again?</em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>His father shoved him back but Brian surged forward the second he could, getting in his old man’s face. </em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>“Get your hands off of him!” Letty barked at Earl. She looked ready to rage but Earl just laughed in her face. </em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>“I thought they said your Mark was a man? He whoring you out to his employees or something?” His father asked like that was the grandest joke he had ever heard. </em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>“Letty, go get Dom.” Leon said evenly. He didn’t take his eyes off of Earl, his exterior nothing but calm, “And you take your hands off of Brian.” </em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>The hand his father had clamped around his arm shoved him back just to yank him forward and down onto his knees. His shoulder didn’t appreciate it at all and Brian felt the joint threaten to give as he crashed down onto the ground in the middle of Letty’s swearing. Certainly wouldn’t be the first time that shoulder popped out of its socket. </em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>“You don’t tell me what to do, scum.” Earl snarled at Leon from above Brian. </em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>Then his boot came flying towards Brian, catching him in the hip and sending him to his back. The hit hurt so bad Brian’s vision went a little hazy but he was used to this. Used to all of it. He knew not to let himself go down, it wasn’t safe to go unaware. </em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>Sure enough, his father lunged for Leon and it was only Brian grabbing hold of his leg that saved Leon from a black eye. </em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>“Letty, go!” Leon demanded. </em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>“You go with ‘er. None of this concerns you.” Earl shouted. “Get out of my face.” </em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>Brian let his leg go, his hands felt like they were tingling just from having to touch him. He stood and glared, “You want me gone every day of my life, so I left. I’m gone. Why the fuck are you here?” </em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>“You don’t tell me when I’m done with you, piece of shit! You belong to me. You both belong to me and you always will.” Earl shouted in his face. “Havin’ your Mark tell those people no when I say you show your face. Who the fuck do you think you are?” </em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>So this was just a tantrum them. He wasn’t getting his way, he felt like Brian was dismissing him. So here he was, proving to the both of them that Brian would never really get away. No matter what he did, he was stuck forever with Earl O’Conner screaming in his face. Brian had lost over a year of his life to juvie and Dom’s custody and none of it mattered. </em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>He was always going to be here again. Standing in front of a man who hated him too much to let him go, bruised up and done. </em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>Letty was gone and when Leon reached for Earl again, Brian could see Jesse over his shoulder absolutely frozen. He knew Jesse did badly with people yelling – just another person Brian was dragging down with this inescapable shit. </em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>Like a five year old who hadn’t learned the lesson yet, Brian focused more on Jesse than he did on his father just long enough for Earl to shove him again. When Brian went down this time, he fell right onto the hood of his car. </em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>Fuck this. </em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>“Stop!” </em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>It wasn’t a request. It was a roar that shook Brian’s bones. </em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>It was Dom. </em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>Brian was half collapsed on the hood of his baby and when he looked up, Dom was already charging towards them like an angry bull. </em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>Even his father shut his mouth. </em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>Brian stared, waiting to see what this was going to be. His worst nightmare, once. Dom and his Father, both with some level of power over him, standing together. </em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>Dom was still moving, and Earl started to say, “Who the…” </em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>That was all he got out before Dom’s hand went around his throat. Just one. Squeezing just hard enough to get his point across. His father made a choking noise as Dom walked him backwards by the grip on his neck. </em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>“You don’t come here again.” Dom said slow and precise. “You don’t speak to him. You don’t touch him. I find you within fifty feet of my soulmate again, and I’ll take every right being his Mark gives me. No court in this country would convict me of anything.” </em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>Brian stood up and turned so he was facing his father. They didn’t speak. Brian didn’t want to say another word to him ever again. </em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>Earl didn’t either. Too proud. </em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>He looked straight at Brian though and in that moment, Brian knew that Dom…</em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>Had won.</em>
</p>
<p>A slamming of metal on metal jerked Brian awake. His heart was racing and the dim lighting of not quite morning was startling. Seconds ago he had been in the gleaming sunlight of the garage with the team, with <em>Dom</em>, and now he was lying on his bunk in the semi-darkness of juvie too early in the morning.</p>
<p>He was half sat up from being startled awake and once reality set in, he dropped back down onto the bed panting.</p>
<p>What the fuck was that?</p>
<p>There was a burning in his eyes that Brian knew was tears. He shut them tightly. He wasn’t going to cry.</p>
<p>He knew exactly what that dream was.</p>
<p>It was what would have gone down if he had waited just another minute. If he’d had faith that Dom would protect him. If he hadn’t of decided to solve the problem himself by running.</p>
<p>It was what would have happened if Brian had trusted Dom.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>---</strong>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>It wasn’t until hours later that Brian realized that Dom had probably had those dreams too. Dreams where he had heard the fight himself and had come out in time to break it up. Dreams where Letty or Jesse pounded on his office door and pulled him and Vince out to the main garage to deal with Brian’s father. Dreams where he had driven fast enough to catch up to Brian and had gotten him to stop before he caught the attention of the police.</p>
<p>Dom was torturing himself with those <em>what ifs</em>. Brian knew he was.</p>
<p>Even when it wasn’t Brian’s intention, even when he hadn’t even been thinking of Dom at all, Brian still hurt him.</p>
<p>Maybe that was the point?</p>
<p>Dom had promised him to keep his father away. And yeah, short of organizing a mob hit there wasn’t really anything that could have prevented his father from showing up at the garage. Finding out his Mark’s name would be easy enough through enough conversations with the state staff who were in charge of Brian’s case. From there, the garage was called DT’s for fucks sake, finding Dom through it wasn’t a challenge.</p>
<p>So that part, the finding him part, wasn’t the problem. Brian didn’t blame Dom for that and Dom hopefully didn’t blame himself for that either. It was out of their hands.</p>
<p>The rest of it though?</p>
<p>He could have stayed. He could have waited another minute. Fuck, his brain was dreaming out those lost moments at night so obviously they weren’t out of the realm of possibility.</p>
<p>The point was, Dom had promised to keep his father away from Brian and Brian <em>believed him</em>. He had trusted that promise. He <em>did</em> trust that promise.</p>
<p>And that was weird but kind of great but it meant jackshit if Brian didn’t actually even think of it in the moment.</p>
<p>He knew Dom well enough to know that all of this shit had occurred to him too. Probably even that Brian <em>didn’t</em> trust him to do what he had promised. There had to be serious pain in those thoughts to Dom…</p>
<p>And it was all Brian’s fault, yet again.</p>
<p>Maybe this was the way that Brian would be the monster in their relationship. Not overt cruelty but this lack of trust that would chip away at Dom until there was nothing but pain left. Brian had said it before, that he was maybe too fucked up for any of this love and trust shit, and Dom had rejected it. Just because Dom didn’t want to believe it though, didn’t mean it wasn’t true.</p>
<p>They were living the aftermath of it right this second.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>---</strong>
</p>
<p>It hadn’t meant a thing to Brian before. Knowing that he was the keeper of Dom’s heart had meant nothing to him.</p>
<p>It was upsetting to find that now he did care about it. He wanted to do right by it.</p>
<p>He gave a shit whether he broke Dom’s heart or not.</p>
<p>Even worse? All he seemed capable of doing was hurting him.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>---</strong>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Two weeks out from freedom, he got called in to some woman’s office.</p>
<p>“Hello, Brian. My name is Courtney.” She said entirely too cheerily for where she worked. Even her office was decently nice. Like she had pictures of sunsets on the walls and literally three different vases of flowers. On the one hand, overkill. But on the other, this was a gray hell dimension and if her sanity was held together with a few floral arrangements then she got no judgment from him.</p>
<p>“Hi,” He answered as he sat down in the seat she gestured to. It was cushy, softer than his mattress. Although, most things that weren’t beds of nails were better than his mattress so…</p>
<p>Courtney gave him a conspiratorial smile and reached into a drawer to pull out a big metal mixing bowl full of candy. “Have some, please. Whatever you want. Did they explain what you and I are doing today?”</p>
<p>She had Reese’s.</p>
<p>Brian grabbed one and shook his head.</p>
<p>“Okay, well, this is a good meeting. We’re going to talk about your release!” Courtney said. She was honestly just the right amount of pep. Not obnoxious, just like she was genuinely happy for him and liked her job.</p>
<p>Weird.</p>
<p>“So,” She started, “You’re due to leave us two weeks from tomorrow. Let’s talk about how that’s going to go. You’re going to have your usual morning and after breakfast, they’ll bring you back to my office. We’ve got some paperwork to fill out. Nothing daunting and I’ll have as much done for you as I can. You’ll be eighteen, so you sign for yourself. With me so far?”</p>
<p>Brian nodded.</p>
<p>If she was bothered by him being quiet, she didn’t let on.</p>
<p>“After we do our signing, you’ll get back any personal affects you came in with. For you, it looks like you came in wearing a different outfit and shoes. We’ll give that back.” She continued. “So that takes care of what you’re wearing after we spring you lose!”</p>
<p>He took a crunch bar. Courtney just smiled wider.</p>
<p>“Is there someone you’d like me to arrange to have pick you up?” Courtney asked a little less cheerily than last time. She’d probably gotten some pretty depressing answers on that front in the past.</p>
<p>That was something he hadn’t considered. He wasn’t getting out on exactly his birthday, the wheels of government didn’t run that smoothly.</p>
<p>So that meant Dom had no idea <em>when</em> he was getting out.</p>
<p>“You tell anyone about this stuff? Like, do you have some list you have to inform?” Brian asked.</p>
<p>Courtney shook her head, “I assume you mean outside of the government? No, I don’t. And because you’ll be eighteen I <em>can’t</em> talk to anyone about your release unless you sign a consent form. I have them handy, is there someone you’d like me to call?”</p>
<p>“No.”</p>
<p>The answer came before he’d even really decided.</p>
<p>Courtney’s expression didn’t change, “You have some time to change your mind. I know you have a Mark on file, I can call him if you want but I don’t have to. I actually can’t unless you say you want me to.”</p>
<p>If she called, Dom would be out there waiting for him when he walked out of here.</p>
<p>Brian could picture it <em>so easily</em>.</p>
<p>Dom in some white t-shirt that made his skin glow standing beside the car that would get him out of here.</p>
<p>No…</p>
<p><em>His </em>car. The Supra.</p>
<p>Fuck. His Mark standing beside his baby, ready to drive the fuck away from this place.</p>
<p>That image and how much he <em>wanted it </em>came with the worst realization in the world. Brian sat there staring at nothing trying to come to terms with it.</p>
<p>He was in love with Dom.</p>
<p>“Brian?” Courtney asked gently like she had teenage boys come to life-altering realizations in her office all the time. “Are you okay? Do you want me to call your Mark and arrange for him to come pick you up when you’re released?”</p>
<p>Brian shut his eyes and breathed out slowly. “No.”</p>
<p>He loved Dominic Toretto.</p>
<p>And he was too fucked up to be in a relationship where he didn’t just tear Dom apart.</p>
<p>So he had to leave. He had to leave for Dom’s own good. For the safety of his heart, Brian had to go.</p>
<p>“No.” He said one last time, more sure than ever.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>---</strong>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Brian dragged through the next two weeks like a zombie, like they weren’t even real.</p>
<p>The morning of his release, he got dressed in the clothes that Mia had bought him. He signed the papers that Courtney put in front of his face. He made his transportation arrangements through her, alone, just himself.</p>
<p>And when he walked out of that building and Dom wasn’t standing there waiting for him, Brian felt his absence like a blow to the gut.</p>
<p>His steps faltered and for one single aching moment, he thought about turning around. Going back to Courtney’s office and telling her he’d changed his mind. She might even let him use her phone himself. He could call the house or the store or the garage and talk to Dom and <em>go home</em>.</p>
<p>Dom would come for him. He knew that without any doubt in his heart. Dom would race here as fast has he could. He would drop everything to be the one who took him away from this place again. Even if he was kind of pissed about what had happened. Even if Brian was maybe too messed up. Dom would come.</p>
<p>
  <em>You love him. </em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>And all you’re good for is hurting him. </em>
</p>
<p>Even this was going to hurt him. Brian disappearing without a word. This would hurt him.</p>
<p>There were no good choices. Leaving would hurt, one rush of pain and then it would gradually die off as Dom got used to living without him. Maybe it would flare up sometimes. Dom was a determined guy, he wasn’t going to just forget Brian.</p>
<p>Or Brian could call him and go back to him. He could even try to really be the person that Dom deserved.</p>
<p>He’d fail, but he could try.</p>
<p>And his failure, all the little pieces of it, would just cut into Dom over and over and over again. Brian would make him happy sometimes but he’d hurt him too. Sometimes big things, sometimes little things.</p>
<p>For how long? Until Dom got tired of it and pushed him away? Maybe, but it’d take a while. Until Brian manned up and went through with walking away like he should have from the start.</p>
<p>He was doing the right thing. Leaving was the right thing.</p>
<p>So Brian took a step forward, not back.</p>
<p>Alone.</p>
<p> </p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>I hope you liked the chapter! I fear your reactions but I'm also very desperately looking forward to what everyone feels about the chapter and Brian's choice! Just a reminder that this story is from Brian's point of view and he's kind of messed up. So please do not throw stones at the author, yeah? ;)</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0018"><h2>18. Chapter Eighteen</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <hr/>
<p>
  <strong>Chapter Eighteen </strong>
</p>
<hr/>
<p>
  
</p>
<p>“Holy shit, bro!”</p>
<p>Brian grinned at Rome, happy to see someone and have it not hurt. Rome was Rome. Didn’t matter where it was or when, he was always the same. “Took too long to find you, man.”</p>
<p>Rome pulled Brian in for a hug and a pat on the back. “Sorry, Bri, I’ve only been here like a month. Didn’t really think about it. My mom called, said you’d been by and were coming over here. I didn’t know you’d gotten out.”</p>
<p>He ushered Brian inside his new place and Brian was sort of amused to see one beat up couch, a tv on a couple of cinderblocks and a lamp on the floor. Looked about right.</p>
<p>“My aunt owns this duplex. In exchange for mowing the lawn and keeping the crackhead next door in line, I get this.” Rome’s chest puffed out showing off his new castle.</p>
<p>Brian laughed, he was pretty sure this was Rome’s mom trying to control his independence from afar and getting her sister to help, but he’d met Rome so he got it. “It’s nice, man. I’m jealous.”</p>
<p>And homeless.</p>
<p>“Hey, anytime your Mark gets too annoying, you come over. Stay the night even, make him regret whatever sin he’s committed.” Rome offered generously.</p>
<p>Brian didn’t say anything and he knew his smile went a little fake.</p>
<p>Rome’s eyes narrowed, “Aw fuck.”</p>
<p>He didn’t know where to start.</p>
<p>“You can’t have gotten out that long ago. How could he have already pissed you off?” Rome asked. “I figured he’d be worshipping the ground you walk on for a while yet.”</p>
<p>Brian flinched, “I haven’t seen him. I got out this morning.”</p>
<p>That seemed to only amp up Rome’s confusion, “Well I’m real flattered, Bri but seriously, the fuck are you doing here? Why am I your first stop on the freedom tour?”</p>
<p>When Brian hesitated, Rome grabbed his arm and pushed him down onto the couch. Instead of sitting beside him, Rome stood in front of him with his hands on his hips. Sometimes, he was way too much like his mother.</p>
<p>“I’m not going back to him.” Brian said the words even though they made something twist up inside of him.</p>
<p>“This about what he did?” Rome asked seriously.</p>
<p>Brian shook his head, “No, we talked about that. Before, I mean. The guy he beat to shit caused a crash that killed his father. Burned him alive in an explosion on the tracks. Dom sort of lost control. He… well, it’s not really mine to talk about but he regrets it. I’m not holding it against him.”</p>
<p>There was a mixture of annoyance and weird relief on Rome’s face. Brian knew him well enough to interpret. He was annoyed that his informant hadn’t mentioned that vital bit of context and he was relieved that Brian’s Mark had a semi-justifiable reason for what he’d done. It would never be completely justifiably and it would always be wrong – but there were degrees and Brian couldn’t condemn Dom for any of it.</p>
<p>Apparently Rome couldn’t either. Nice to know.</p>
<p>“Okay then, what’s the problem?” Rome questioned with his hands out.</p>
<p>Brian stared at him. “I love him.”</p>
<p>Rome stared back. “Boy, you are fucked up.”</p>
<p>That made him laugh, “You have no idea.”</p>
<p>“You love him, great. He’s your Mark, you’re kind of supposed to love him in case no one’s told you yet. So what is this? Loving him freak you out?” He seemed to think better of that question, “I mean, obviously it freaks you out but like, what flavor of freaked out are you? Walk me through it.”</p>
<p>No part of him really wanted to take Rome on the mental journey that Brian had been on. So he just said, “Being near me is only going to hurt him. I don’t want that, so I have to go. And I need you to help me leave.”</p>
<p>“Shit,” Rome said under his breath. He turned away from Brian before coming back in about three seconds, “We’re going to deal with the second part of what you just said in a minute. Go back to the first part. You realize that guy is like, head over heels for you right? Like it’s sort of embarrassing how a big tough guy like that looks at you, Brian. Not sure if you’ve noticed but he’s in love with you too.”</p>
<p>“I noticed.” Brian admitted easily. He’d noticed months ago, he just hadn’t wanted to let himself acknowledge it. .</p>
<p>“Okay, so why would he be happier if you weren’t around?” Rome asked.</p>
<p>Brian sighed and dropped his head in his hands, “I didn’t say he’d be happier. He’ll be pissed for sure. All I do is hurt him, Rome. You said it, I’m fucked up. All I’m ever going to be able to do is hurt him.”</p>
<p>Rome crouched down in front of him, “That’s your father talking. You’re only as messed up as the rest of us, Brian. Everyone’s their own special kind of fucked up. So it’ll take you longer to settle into this soulmate thing. He’s aware. He’s patient. He’s been dealin’ with your ass for nearly a year and he’s already gotten you to fall in love with him. Stick it out, see where you end up.”</p>
<p>He shook his head almost frantically, “I can’t. Rome, please, I can’t.”</p>
<p>There was straight up pity in Rome’s eyes and Brian couldn’t even be pissed. He knew he was sinking down to a truly pathetic place.</p>
<p>“You know people,” Brian was halfway to begging, “Help me get a car, I’ll do the rest. I just need to go. Please, do this for me.”</p>
<p>“You have a car.” Rome protested.</p>
<p>Brian shut his eyes. He’d gotten to drive his baby for about six minutes or less and he’d been too frantic to even <em>feel</em> it. “I don’t. It’s his.”</p>
<p>“You put your sweat into it, it’s yours. Any claim he had on it was forfeit the minute you fell in love with it.” Rome said gently.</p>
<p>His eyes were burning.</p>
<p>With a heavy breath, Rome stood. “Let me make some calls, see what I can do. I’ve got too many clothes, you can take some, and an old burner phone I have.”</p>
<p>“Thank you.” Brian’s throat was nearly too tight to get the words out.</p>
<p>“There’s a price.” Rome said as serious as he ever managed to get.</p>
<p>Brian just looked up at him.</p>
<p>“One, you be careful. If this is some blaze of glory shit I’ll never forgive you.” He waited for Brian to shake his head. Dying wasn’t on the agenda. “Good, keep it that way. Second is that you have to call me every other day. I want your word on your mother you call me every two days. Even if you’re busy. Even if you’re pissed at me. You have to call me.”</p>
<p>He stood up, facing Rome square on so they were looking in each other’s eyes.</p>
<p>“On my mother.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>---</strong>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Rome tried to convince him to stay the night, probably hoping that in those hours he’d change his mind or Dom would find him.</p>
<p>Brian knew better.</p>
<p>The car Rome had somehow gotten him was decent. He wouldn’t win any races with it in LA but he wasn’t planning on staying so that was fine. Once he got further out and the cars got shittier, even his mid-level Coca-Cola red car would get him some money. What he lacked in machinery he made up for in skill.</p>
<p>Rome’s mother didn’t trust him to actually grocery shop on his own, so she stocked him up regularly. Rome wouldn’t hear of Brian not taking some for the road, so he got a couple of outfits worth of clothes, a cellphone that had definitely been used for something shady in the past and enough food to tide him over until he could get racing.</p>
<p>From there, Brian drove.</p>
<p>He had some vague plan for Miami but he was in no rush to get there. He’d never left California in his entire life. It wasn’t so much that he had any urgent need to see Nebraska but the freedom to just turn his wheel and go wherever the fuck he wanted helped ease off some of the anxiety.</p>
<p>That feeling was vital when Brian felt anything but steady.</p>
<p>It was weird how genuinely unstable he felt. Like without Dom to even him out or the structure of juvie or the rules he’d had to follow to keep himself safe from his father as best he could, he felt sort of like he didn’t know how to function.</p>
<p>Sometimes, his heart just raced. There was nothing wrong. He wasn’t even thinking intense thoughts most of the time. Still, he’d just sit there with his heart pounding halfway out of his chest.</p>
<p>He was pretty sure it was all in his head.</p>
<p>Hopefully.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>---</strong>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Still alive.”</p>
<p><em>“Good job.”</em> Rome said, <em>“My mother wants to make sure that you’re eating.”</em></p>
<p>He laughed, “I’m eating.”</p>
<p>
  <em>“Still in California?” </em>
</p>
<p>Brian looked out his windshield at the Arizona desert stretched out in front of him, “Nope.”</p>
<p>
  <em>“Win any money yet?” </em>
</p>
<p>“Few hundred,” Brian answered truthfully. He hadn’t lost yet.</p>
<p><em>“Take some of it and get a hotel room for the night. Sleep in an actual bed.”</em> Rome instructed him like this wasn’t up for discussion.</p>
<p>Brian could only answer, “I’ll think about it.”</p>
<p>Rome just sighed.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>---</strong>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Brian took his advice a few days later, mostly because he was getting a little grungy. He waited for a motel to come up that was close to a Laundromat, figuring he’d get his money’s worth out of this town. They even had a diner, so he treated himself with Miguel the sore loser’s money. He’d been living off protein bars and chips mostly, so eating an actual hot meal was halfway to orgasmic.</p>
<p>Still had nothing on Mia’s cooking. Dom’s either.</p>
<p>He wasn’t thinking about that.</p>
<p>By now, they had to have realized what he’d done.</p>
<p>He wasn’t thinking about that either.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>---</strong>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>New Mexico, he decided, was probably a lot like Arizona – so he decided to go up towards Colorado. Not Denver, he’d heard it was hella expensive there. Just random towns.</p>
<p>The panicky heartbeat thing hadn’t eased off. He figured once he got into the rhythm of this road trip lifestyle it would. Apparently he had been wrong.</p>
<p>He kept dreaming about that last day in the garage too. For whatever reason, he’d thought once his time in juvie was over he’d get over it. Or his mind would, at least. Wrong again.</p>
<p>Feeling like everything he’d thought was wrong only made him panic worse.</p>
<p>It was maybe getting to be a problem.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>---</strong>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>On one of his rare motel days, Brian found a second-hand shop that had tools in it. Nothing fancy, but they were enough. The tires on his car were for shit so he used his winnings to buy a better set and changed them out. While he was at it, he decided to do an oil change. Things were a little makeshift in the motel’s parking lot and it wasn’t like either task was particularly interesting, but working on the car eased off some of the weird nervous energy he’d been dealing with.</p>
<p>Between the (minor) upgrades and the night in the motel, his money stores were down to virtually nothing. If he wanted food or another night in a motel anytime soon, he needed to race asap.</p>
<p>That was okay though, he’d known going into this that upgrading the car was going to be a necessary risk. If he ate a cold can of soup for dinner, that was a sacrifice he was willing to make.</p>
<p>His stomach was way less on board.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>---</strong>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Still alive.”</p>
<p><em>“You gotta come up with something else to say.”</em> Rome shot back.</p>
<p>Brian laughed, “Getting straight to the point.”</p>
<p>There was a pause, then, <em>“Well allow me to do the same. Your Mark showed up here yesterday.”</em></p>
<p>That wasn’t a surprise, not really…</p>
<p>So why did Brian lean his head back against the headrest and sigh? “Sorry?”</p>
<p>
  <em>“It’s fine. I figured he’d show up. Turns out my mom held him up for a while or he’d of been in my face a lot sooner.” </em>
</p>
<p>“Mrs. Pearce is a hell of a woman.” Brian said.</p>
<p><em>“Hell of a romantic too. Not sure what Dom said to her but she melted, man. I got a call about it and everything, warning me to let him in and talk to him.” </em>Rome laughed,<em> “You’re lucky she don’t know where you are.” </em></p>
<p>“Technically,” Brian couldn’t help but point out, “You don’t either.”</p>
<p>Rome snorted like that was minor, <em>“He had a message for you.”</em></p>
<p>Brian wasn’t sure he wanted to hear it.</p>
<p>His silence didn’t stop Rome.</p>
<p>
  <em>“Call me.” </em>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>---</strong>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p><em>Call me</em>, Dom demanded.</p>
<p>So Brian didn’t.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>---</strong>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>By the next day, the not calling thing had him jittery. If he called Rome tomorrow and hadn’t called, he’d be hearing about it. The idea of Rome like, <em>scolding him</em> for it, pushing him to call – it just made him more nervous.</p>
<p>Brian was dealing with enough weird jittery nervous, thanks.</p>
<p>So he called.</p>
<p>He waited until it was daytime, when they should have all been at work. He was hoping that no one would answer he and he could leave a message saying he was okay and his conscience would be clear. Rome’s phone was untraceable so it wasn’t like they could call him back either. If Rome hadn’t given them the number already, he wouldn’t. He knew better.</p>
<p>Brian pumped himself up for it. No one was gonna be home. Leave a message. Don’t get deep, just stick to the basics.</p>
<p>His heart was about to pound right out of his chest. No one was home, leave a message…</p>
<p>Mia answered on the first ring.</p>
<p>Fucking hell.</p>
<p>
  <em>“Toretto residence.” </em>
</p>
<p>Brian’s throat closed right up.</p>
<p>
  <em>“Hello?” </em>
</p>
<p>He’d missed hearing her voice. Fuck his entire life.</p>
<p>
  <em>“Brian?” </em>
</p>
<p><em>Man up! </em>“Hey Mia.”</p>
<p>She wasted not even a second, <em>“Hey Mia? That’s what you’re going to open with? Hey Mia? You…”</em> She pulled in a deep breath and he could picture the expression on her face so clearly. <em>“Sorry, I’m not mad.”</em></p>
<p>“You sound mad.”</p>
<p>Mia laughed, <em>“Okay, I’m kind of mad. Not really at you though.” </em></p>
<p>“Who else?” Brian couldn’t help but ask.</p>
<p>Her laugh got a little tremulous and he <em>hated</em> hearing it. <em>“Everyone in your life that brought you to this point. Brian, please come home.”</em></p>
<p>Home.</p>
<p>“Is he there? Took me a while to work up the nerve to call.” Brian tried to joke but it fell flat instantly.</p>
<p>
  <em>“He’s not and he’s going to be so upset that he missed you. He’s… doing some stuff.” </em>
</p>
<p>Looking for you. That’s what she wasn’t saying. Hunting up leads.</p>
<p><em>“We’ve been taking turns here, so someone was always around to answer the phone. Vince chewed out a telemarketer yesterday for calling three times and cluttering up the line.”</em> Mia’s joke went over better.</p>
<p>“Having to listen to Vince bitch probably got you guys on the Do Not Call list.” Brian laughed. This time, he sounded more like a person capable of humor. This was <em>normal </em>in a way he couldn’t really explain. The two of them talking like this. It felt good.</p>
<p><em>“We’re definitely never going to hear from Sirius Satellite Radio again,”</em> Mia agreed and she giggled. <em>“No loss. They’re the worst.” </em></p>
<p>He didn’t know what to say next, all he knew was that he didn’t want to lose this moment.</p>
<p>She must have sensed it too, <em>“Brian…” </em></p>
<p>“If he’s not there then just tell him I called and I’m fine, okay?” Brian cut her off quietly.</p>
<p><em>“No!”</em> Mia half shouted at him, <em>“No, you’re going to call back in an hour, do you understand me?”</em> When he tried to say something else – probably goodbye – it was her turn to cut him off, <em>“Do you realize how bad you’ll hurt him if you don’t call back? He’ll never leave this house again because he’ll be too afraid to miss your call again. You’ll break him, Brian. Call back in an hour and I’ll make sure he’s here. Promise me.” </em></p>
<p>He was making a lot of promises lately.</p>
<p>What she was saying made painful sense though… and he knew he couldn’t do that to Dom. “An hour.”</p>
<p>Mia let out a shaky sigh, <em>“An hour. You promise?”</em></p>
<p>“I promise.”</p>
<p>
  <em>“Brian?” </em>
</p>
<p>“Hmm?”</p>
<p>There was a beat of silence before she said, <em>“He made us promise that we wouldn’t… obviously we’ve got things we’d like to say too. I don’t know what this is but we’re not mad, okay? You can come home anytime and we’ll be happy to see you. Or if you need to talk about something, you can call me. Even if it’s two in the morning or something. Even if you don’t want to talk to Dom. I’m here and you’re my brother too, okay?”</em></p>
<p>He bit his lip to keep from making any sound and tilted his head back to stare at the roof of the car. <em>Fuck</em>, why did that one word make him want to cry?</p>
<p>“Okay,” He whispered.</p>
<p><em>“One hour.”</em> Mia said again, <em>“Unless you want to talk while I text him to come home?”</em></p>
<p>He shook his head before remembering that he was thousands of miles away from her and she couldn’t see it. “No,” His voice was practically a croak.</p>
<p><em>“One hour then,”</em> She kept repeating it like he might forget. He wouldn’t forget for anything in the world, no matter how much he felt like it was some sort of execution scheduled. He’d wanted to leave a message and even psyching himself up for that had taken everything he had. This was going to be a hundred times worse.</p>
<p>“One hour.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>---</strong>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>The need to go fast and forget was overwhelming.</p>
<p>It was broad daylight and he’d already learned the lesson but everything inside of him felt like it was going to explode.</p>
<p>So he found a stretch of road that looked pretty deserted and <em>gunned it</em>.</p>
<p>Just hearing his tires squeal eased off some of the panicky energy making him twitchy.</p>
<p>When he’d gotten far enough, he cut the wheel so he spun out in a circle.</p>
<p>That felt good too.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>---</strong>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>At the fifty eight minute mark, he pulled over to puke.</p>
<p>He was pissed at himself even while he did it. Money was tight and that food was pretty much everything he had for the rest of the day. If he barfed up breakfast on the side of the road, he was going to be pretty goddamned hungry in a few hours.</p>
<p>Logic and nausea didn’t mesh.</p>
<p>By the time his stomach stopped cramping, it was sixty four minutes since he had hung up with Mia. He wanted to say that it wasn’t a big deal except he knew Dom was on the other end of this whole thing counting every second.</p>
<p>He got back in the car and pulled his cell out.</p>
<p>And stared at it.</p>
<p>Sixty eight minutes.</p>
<p>He was an asshole.</p>
<p>Sixty nine minutes.</p>
<p>Brian made the call.</p>
<p>Again, the thing got half a ring before Dom picked up. So he had been waiting and desperate while Brian had been sick all over the side of the road. Nice to have confirmation even though there hadn’t been any doubt in his mind at all.</p>
<p>
  <em>“Are you okay?” </em>
</p>
<p>If hearing Mia’s voice had been good, hearing Dom’s was on a whole other level. The deep rumble on the other end of the phone made Brian exhale in a way that left him boneless afterwards. “I’m good. How are you?”</p>
<p><em>“Do you need money?”</em> Dom asked, ignoring Brian’s question.</p>
<p>“Fuck, Dom, no.” Brian answered. He was going to do his level best to <em>never</em> have to ask Dom for money.</p>
<p>
  <em>“Be honest with me.” </em>
</p>
<p>“I’m honestly okay. I have a car, I’m racing. I’m <em>winning</em>.” Brian tried to make it sound more glamorous than it actually was. Although, the winning part wasn’t a lie.</p>
<p>There was a heavy silence.</p>
<p>Brian wasn’t going to be the one that broke it. Dom had asked him to call, not the other way around.</p>
<p>He was aware that thought was pretty childish.</p>
<p><em>“Is this… is this you like letting off steam or something? No freedom to full freedom? Is this… what is this, Brian?” </em>Dom asked finally.</p>
<p>That was about the last thing that he wanted to talk about. “Nothing to do with freedom, although that’s been… weird. Nice, I guess. Mostly weird.”</p>
<p><em>“This is it about your father?”</em> Dom’s voice dropped down even quieter and Brian hadn’t been sure that was possible. <em>“We put cameras in the garage when we did the store. We used the video of him attacking you and Leon. We couldn’t do anything to get you out of juvie, we tried, but Leon pressed charges and in his statement to the police he admitted he’d come there because of us. You and me. I used that to get a restraining order, Brian. He can’t come near me. Can’t come to my home or my businesses. If you’re here and I’m here, he can’t come near you without going straight to the police.” </em></p>
<p>Brian heard himself say “What?” but speaking had been completely involuntary. It was the absolute last thing he had been expecting Dom to say. He almost felt dizzy, it had jolted him so badly.</p>
<p><em>“I’m sorry.”</em> Dom said like the guilt had been eating him alive. It was even more painful to hear because he knew the guilt <em>had</em> been eating Dom alive.</p>
<p>“Nothing to be sorry about.” Brian promised quietly. “You… you know what I realized?” He waited for an answer but Dom didn’t seem capable of one. “You would have handled him.”</p>
<p>Dom sighed heavily, <em>“I made them tell me everything that went down. I watched that tape five hundred times. I’ve been so pissed at Letty. Jesse’s one thing. He froze and I know why. I’d never be mad at him for it. Letty though… she just kept running her mouth. She wasn’t making anything better. If she had gone for me the first time Leon told her to, none of this would have happened.” </em></p>
<p>Brian let out a laugh that was maybe a little too wet to be convincing, “Not in her nature. As if Letty could ever shut her mouth and run for backup. Don’t be pissed at her.”</p>
<p><em>“Vince and I were talking and the door was shut. I couldn’t hear anything over the fans. But Brian, as soon as she came in and told me, I was out there. I would have made him back off. I would have made him think twice about ever coming near you again.”</em> Dom’s voice was as intense as it ever got. This was like the first time. It was a vow.</p>
<p>“I know.” Brian reassured him. “And when you promised, I believed you. After it was done, and I was back in juvie you know it took me like two weeks to realize if I had just stopped and waited, you would have done all that? Dom, in that moment it never even <em>occurred</em> to me.”</p>
<p>
  <em>“That’s better than I thought.” </em>
</p>
<p>Brian’s eyes almost bugged out, “Are you serious? That’s better than you thought?”</p>
<p><em>“I’ve spent this whole time thinking you just didn’t trust me. Now you’re saying you would have if you had been thinking straight? Okay, your first instinct isn’t to rely on me. I knew that. I’d rather it was that instead of you just not trusting me outright.” </em>Dom said.</p>
<p>“Trusting you when you promise me something doesn’t mean a whole lot if I forget in the moment. Think of all this shit, Dom. All of this was because of me.” Brian would always believe that was true, no matter what came out of Dom’s mouth next, “All I ever do is flinch and when I do… when I do I hurt you. I don’t want to hurt you, Dom. I don’t want to break your heart.”</p>
<p>Dom’s voice went a little more gentle. Maybe he was finally getting it. <em>“Let me worry about my own heart.”</em></p>
<p>“I can’t.” Brian bit his lip and pulled in as deep a breath as he could. “I can’t because… because I love you.”</p>
<p>The silence was frightening and he had no idea why.</p>
<p>
  <em>“I love you too.” </em>
</p>
<p>Those words didn’t make it any better. “Then you understand.”</p>
<p>Dom sort of laughed, <em>“No, baby, I don’t understand. Explain it.”</em></p>
<p>“I know you’d rather I came back. I know I’m hurting you. But if I did, I’d hurt you then too. I’d fuck up, I’d forget to trust you again. I’d ruin everything over and over again. And each time I did, I would be hurting you. So it’s better this way. One last stab of my knife.” Brian felt his eyes start to burn. He felt like he was pleading with Dom more than he was explaining.</p>
<p><em>“Look at where we already are, Brian. Okay, when you panic you forget to trust me. And this time, it cost us months. It won’t always be like that.”</em> Dom argued like he was pleading too. He <em>was</em> pleading. They both were.</p>
<p>
  <em>Understand me. </em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>Let me love you the only way I know how. </em>
</p>
<p>Except they didn’t understand each other, not really, and the ways they knew how to love were completely incompatible. Even Dom had to see it.</p>
<p>“You don’t know that.” Brian insisted. “Next time it might be worse. Next time I might fuck up something that can’t be fixed.”</p>
<p><em>“Or there might never be a next time. If you can say I don’t know, then I can say you don’t know.”</em> Dom countered easily. He was right and he was wrong. They were both right and wrong, maybe. Neither of them could predict the future. Brian knew what his entire life had been though, and Dom didn’t.</p>
<p>“Nothing stays good for me. Nothing, Dom.” And that was it. That simple truth was where the tears started falling. “Sooner or later, there’s going to be something else. And then another thing and another. And I’m just going to keep digging in and making you bleed.”</p>
<p><em>“If something else happens, we can deal with it together. First you think you’ll hate me forever. Now you don’t. Then you think you’ll never trust me. But you do. You were sure you would never love me. Brian, just because you’re sure now that you’ll never learn to rely on me doesn’t mean it won’t happen. No offense but your track record with being sure is pretty lousy. I’m winning.”</em> Dom tried to make it a joke and Brian knew it was because Dom could hear him crying.</p>
<p>“I might be what you prayed for but you deserve better.” Brian said and it hurt how true it was. “I’m so sorry. I’m sorry you’re stuck with me. You should have gotten a Mark who wanted you as much as you wanted them. Someone who could actually function in a relationship. In a family. I’m not that.”</p>
<p>Brian wondered if there was any universe where that person could have been him.</p>
<p><em>“You were learning. Don’t tell me you didn’t feel like you were a part of us. That you <strong>are</strong> a part of us.”</em> Dom insisted.</p>
<p>He <em>had</em> felt like a part of them and that only made this harder. “I don’t want to keep doing this. I don’t want to keep ripping you apart. You’re going to end up hating me. I’m going to hate myself. Fuck, I already do. You want me to give it another try so I can make everything worse?”</p>
<p><em>“You’re punishing yourself.”</em> Dom said flatly.</p>
<p> “What?”</p>
<p><em>“You’re punishing yourself. This isn’t about wanting to save me pain or save yourself pain. This is you thinking you’re unlovable, unworthy. This is you thinking love can only hurt. You won’t let us get stronger because you think you don’t deserve it. So you’re running, because you think you’ll never be a person worthy of what I feel for you. You’re just coming up with reasons at this point, Brian.” </em>Dom’s words were harsh but he wasn’t saying them that way. If anything, he was saying it all like Brian was a child who might shatter from being told the truth.</p>
<p>That didn’t make what he was saying hurt any less.</p>
<p>Dom wasn’t done. <em>“Maybe you do want to protect me, great, thank you. But you’re trying to cause yourself as much pain as you can while you do it.” </em></p>
<p>“That’s not true.” Brian said weakly.</p>
<p><em>“It is. We’ve had this conversation before, baby. We sorted it out already. You’ve had this conversation with Mia too. And Rome. Over and over again. You say you flinch when the going gets tough, I know you do. I know you’re still learning and that’s okay. But it’s not okay to you. You’re making it so much bigger than it has to be. You’re only looking at the moments were you think you fail, you’re not looking at any of the stuff that I am.”</em> Dom said it all so earnestly, like he truly believed every word of what he was saying.</p>
<p>“Yeah?” Brian asked angrily. “And what are you looking at that I’m too stupid to see?”</p>
<p>Dom’s voice went a little harder, <em>“You’re not stupid.”</em></p>
<p>“Apparently I am!”</p>
<p><em>“Don’t use this as another piece of ammunition for you to hurt yourself with.”</em> Dom demanded.</p>
<p>That brought Brian up short.</p>
<p><em>“You puked your guts up and shook so hard I thought you would break into pieces rather than tell me what your father was asking the first time. That hurt me to see. But then you did tell me. I said the right things to convince you to tell me and when I promised you that your father would never come near you, you trusted me. You see that first part and hate yourself. I see the second part and it washes away all my failures that come before. We conquered the problem.”</em> There was genuine pride in Dom’s voice and Brian could feel it through the phone. It was as though there was warmth coming through the connection and just tickling the edge of Brian’s skin.</p>
<p>
  <em>“You ate with your arm curled around your plate for weeks. I know why. That shit was torture to watch. The team hated it too. You know how excited we all were when you stopped? It was before you started coming to the garage and it was the only thing we could talk about when we got in the first morning, you let the death grip on your plate go and you sat up straight so you weren’t hunched over it.” </em>
</p>
<p>Dom wasn’t done.</p>
<p><em>“You got hurt and you weren’t thinking right. I thought for sure you wouldn’t want me anywhere near you. I said I wasn’t going to hurt you and do you remember what you said back to me?”</em> Dom asked.</p>
<p>Brian could barely remember the aftermath of that foiled robbery, “No.”</p>
<p><em>“You said ‘I know’. You were bleeding and had just gotten your head knocked around and you were so out of it you were hiding yourself under the counter… but you said you knew I wasn’t going to hurt you. Do you have any idea how many times I’ve replayed that in my head?”</em> Even now, months after it had happened, there was still a note of awe in Dom’s voice that made Brian flush.</p>
<p><em>“I can keep going; do you need me to keep going?” </em>Dom asked him seriously.</p>
<p>“No.” Brian answered with a voice that was more a croak than anything else.</p>
<p>How was it possible that Torettos were more intense to deal with over the phone than in person?</p>
<p><em>“You need me to keep going.” </em>Dom said almost immediately, <em>“It’s stupid, but do you know how excited I was when you were comfortable enough to joke about kinks with me? You’ve never really said it, but I saw you size me up when we met. I know where your mind had to have gone. I was so careful in the beginning not to give you any hint that I want you and less than a year later, we’re playfully having a conversation like that? It was all a joke but between that and kissing you, I’ve been in heaven Brian. You have no idea.” </em></p>
<p>“Okay great, I haven’t been a complete asshole. Just mostly one.” Brian tried to laugh off the point Dom was making but his voice wasn’t cooperating. He wasn’t even getting close to the untouchable sarcastic tone he was aiming for. “It doesn’t change the bad shit.”</p>
<p><em>“There will always be bad shit, Brian. Did you think you were going to turn eighteen and everything would be perfect? Did you think that you would choose me once and we’d just be in bliss forever after? That’s not real life. That’s not how recovery works. And yes, that is something I got from one of the books that Mia and I have read about the subject but no, I’m not actually going to the Toretto School of Emotional Bullshit or whatever you call it.”</em> Dom casually dropped a couple of more bombs on Brian.</p>
<p>It wasn’t until Dom asked that Brian realized that yes, he did think those things would be true. Or at least that <em>should</em> have been true.</p>
<p><em>“Someday,” </em>Dom said in a voice that sounded a little like he was agreeing to dental surgery<em>, “I’m going to piss you off. Really piss you off. Or I’m going to hurt your feelings or upset you in some way. And I’ll feel like shit for it, either later on when I cool down or the second after the words are out of my mouth. Will you forget every other good moment between us when that happens?”</em></p>
<p>Brian felt like Dom was hitting him with a battering ram over and over again, “Dom, stop.”</p>
<p><em>“No! I will not stop. You’re punishing yourself, that’s all this is. You’re scared and you’re running. You can come up with any other reason you want but they’re lies. You’re lying to yourself. I’m going to counter every single thing I can think of.” </em>Dom insisted.</p>
<p>The tears wouldn’t stop. He felt so fucking pathetic but they would not stop.</p>
<p>
  <em>“How about this? Your mother must have believed in Marks to have stayed as long as she did. How do you think she would feel knowing you were running away from yours because things went so wrong for her?” </em>
</p>
<p>The feeling of his mother’s soft fingertip running over his Mark to calm him down after his father screamed at them came back to him for the first time ever. Goosebumps went over his skin and he gasped. Not because he was surprised.</p>
<p>Because it hurt.</p>
<p>“Please stop.”</p>
<p><em>“You stop.”</em> Dom said quietly, <em>“Stop hurting the person I love more than anything in this world or the next. Stop hurting me. Stop hurting our family. Come home to me, Brian.”</em></p>
<p>He made it sound so easy and so right.</p>
<p>Brian tried to take a deep breath to steady his voice out. Barely successful. So he tried again while Dom stayed silent.</p>
<p>“Goodbye Dom.”</p>
<p>And then he hung up.</p>
<p> </p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>ONE CHAPTER LEFT!!! </p>
<p>Please let me know what you think! :)</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0019"><h2>19. Chapter Nineteen</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>I can't believe we're here at the end! </p>
<p>I started this story literally three years ago with no intention of ever posting it. I figured no one would really be interested. It was just sort of a fun thing for me to work on occasionally. It wasn't until halfway through I realized that I actually really liked this and maybe a few other people would too. </p>
<p>YOU GUYS HAVE BLOWN ME AWAY! I can't believe the response to this story. I'm so happy you've all enjoyed it. Truly, I cannot thank you all enough for your kind words, your kudos and your bookmarks. Thank you! </p>
<p>And now, without further ado, please enjoy the final chapter!</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <hr/>
<p>
  <strong>Chapter Nineteen</strong>
</p><hr/>
<p>
  
</p>
<p>His whole body was shaking.</p>
<p>It had been since he had hung up with Dom yesterday. That conversation replayed itself in his head over and over again. Every second, every word.</p>
<p>Brian felt like he had sort of lost his mind. This was what Dom had complained about before, how he changed his mind so fast he couldn’t actually get things done. Go home, he turned the car towards California. Stay away, he stopped and turned back.</p>
<p>He was too out of it to race, too out of it to stop and <em>think</em>.</p>
<p>Too afraid to call back.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>---</strong>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Still alive.”</p>
<p>There was a long pause, then, “You sound like shit,”</p>
<p>“I feel like shit.” Why pretend?</p>
<p>“Brian, Dom came to me and told me-”</p>
<p>He hung up.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>---</strong>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>For the first time in his entire life, Brian wanted someone to tell him what to do. He wanted to trust someone so much that he could just hand the reins over and lie down and give it all up for a while.</p>
<p>He was too tired for this shit.</p>
<p>His mind kept racing, turning over the things Dom had said and the things he had said and the things that he would have said if he could live that conversation again. It was like when you stood in the shower four hours after an argument and thought of the perfect comeback. Except now, it was only Brian falling to pieces in his own mind. He was fighting Dom. He was fighting himself.</p>
<p>He was tired.</p>
<p>Last night he had won a race. The first in too long. Two young boys with too much money and a few girls squeezed into the backseat looking to be impressed.</p>
<p>Sorry boys, no triumphant blow jobs for you tonight.</p>
<p>He took the money and got a hotel room for the night. Fuck it…</p>
<p>He was tired.</p>
<p>After turning it around in his head for days, that was pretty much the only thought he had left in him. He was tired. He didn’t know what else to do. What was right?</p>
<p>Was this whole thing really about punishing himself instead of protecting Dom?</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>---</strong>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>When he crossed the border into California, his heart pounding issue slid into an <em>oh my god I can’t breathe</em> issue.</p>
<p>Brian clumsily pulled over onto the shoulder and ignored the blaring horn of the driver who’d had to swerve around him. The harsh noise only made it worse as Brian gripped the steering wheel and tried to remember what taking a full breath felt like.</p>
<p>It felt as though there were an iron band wrapped around his chest.</p>
<p>Never in his life had this ever happened before.</p>
<p>
  <em>It was just California. You’ve always lived there. You’re not afraid of a whole fucking state. Get a grip. You’re not even afraid of Dom.</em>
</p>
<p>Spots swam in his vision.</p>
<p><em>Breathe</em>.</p>
<p>His throat almost whistled when he tried to drag in the next breath. He let it out too fast. Trying on the next round <em>hurt</em>.</p>
<p>
  <em>I’m done. I’m done. </em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>I don’t know what to do. </em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>I want Dom.</em>
</p>
<p>That thought broke to the surface of Brian’s panic and it didn’t exactly make anything better but <em>it didn’t make anything worse either</em>.</p>
<p>Was this what relying on Dom meant? Thinking of him and knowing he’d be here if Brian would just let him?</p>
<p>The next breath hurt and the one after that did too.</p>
<p><em>Count</em>.</p>
<p>He aimed for three. Pull in for three, out for three. When three stopped hurting he tried for four.</p>
<p>He backslid constantly.</p>
<p>The sun had gone down by the time Brian could breathe normally. There was a huge part of him that wanted to find a cheap motel and spend the last of his money to just fall down onto a bed and sleep but…</p>
<p>But he was really close to home.</p>
<p>He could be there before morning.</p>
<p>So Brian drove.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>---</strong>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Was it a choice if he never actually made it?</p>
<p>Or maybe he <em>had</em> made it but it had been so painless that it didn’t really feel like a decision at all.</p>
<p>It was nearly two in the morning when he parked his car outside the dark Toretto house. Vince’s truck was in front of him and Mia’s car in front of Vince’s. Dom’s in the driveway and no one else. That was good. He wasn’t ready for lots of people.</p>
<p>The spare key hadn’t been moved and Brian didn’t think that was an accident.</p>
<p>Walking inside the house nearly made Brian go boneless. He braced a hand against the wall and just breathed.</p>
<p>For a single second, he considered going to his bedroom and just collapsing.</p>
<p>His bed wasn’t really what he was here for though.</p>
<p>So Brian went up the stairs as silently as he could. He turned the corner and he stood in front of Dom’s closed door for only a few seconds. He had permission after all.</p>
<p>Dom didn’t stir when Brian let the door quietly swing open. His Mark was stretched out on his bed…</p>
<p>Facing the phone that had taken up residence on his bedside table.</p>
<p>Well fuck.</p>
<p>Brian toed off his shoes as he went, leaving them forgotten on the ground. Sloppy of him but he was too tired not to care.</p>
<p>When he got to the free side of the bed, he didn’t even bother hesitating. Why now when he was already in this deep?</p>
<p>He laid down.</p>
<p>He laid down on the bed that he was sure he would avoid the rest of his life beside a man that he had so desperately tried to hate.</p>
<p>Maybe Dom was right – Brian really was shit at being sure about things.</p>
<p>Because for the first time since he had seen his father’s sneering face, Brian relaxed. He felt himself sink down into the blankets he was lying on top of and just breathed. His eyes were too heavy to keep open.</p>
<p>Brian fell asleep.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>---</strong>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>It was still dark when Brian woke up.</p>
<p>He couldn’t have been under for long, because even though his head felt a little clearer, he was still almost aching he was so tired. His eyes strained in the low light, trying to figure out why he’d woken up.</p>
<p>It didn’t take long to realize that Dom was sitting up in bed.</p>
<p>He still had his back to Brian. It was sort of like he had woken up on his side, sat up and swung his legs over to sit on the edge of the bed properly. It was probably mostly luck that kept him from seeing Brian.</p>
<p>Dom flicked on the lamp on the bedside table before dropping his head in his hands with a yawn.</p>
<p>Before Brian could really figure out when he should announce he was there and how to do it without giving Dom a heart attack, the other man looked up and froze. He was staring, Brian realized immediately, at his discarded shoes on the ground.</p>
<p>Dom turned around so slowly Brian felt a new stab of guilt. When Dom saw him, he didn’t seem able to speak.</p>
<p>“Hi,” Brian said quietly.</p>
<p>“Hi,” Dom answered with a sleep rough voice.  “Are you okay?”</p>
<p>“Tired.” Brian said truthfully. <em>I’ve been too freaked out to eat much of anything for days, I’m operating on a few hours sleep a night for the last two months and I keep having progressively worse panic attacks to the point that I almost pass out. </em></p>
<p>There was a soft look on Dom’s face that said he’d heard at least some of that. Maybe not the details but he could tell that Brian was more than just tired.</p>
<p>Dom shut the lamp off and laid back down, this time facing Brian. It felt almost uncomfortably intimate and he was grateful the light was off. It felt safer that way although he couldn’t entirely explain why.</p>
<p>“I missed you.” Dom admitted quietly. He reached his hand towards Brian so slowly it took him until it was halfway to his face to realize that Dom meant to touch him.</p>
<p>He gave Brian all the time in the world to jerk back or say no. When his warm hand made contact with Brian’s skin, it felt better than it should have. He had been so alone for so long. More than just the time since he had been last touched – it had been so long since he had trusted a hand coming for his face. It had been so long since someone reached for Brian and he knew without a shadow of a doubt that they weren’t going to hurt him.</p>
<p>Brian turned his head just a little and Dom froze, though he didn’t pull away. When Brian kissed his palm, Dom exhaled loudly enough to be heard.</p>
<p>“I don’t know what I’m doing and I’m tired of trying to figure it out.” Brian whispered.</p>
<p>Dom stroked his thumb over Brian’s cheekbone. If he turned the light back on, he would have been tracing the dark circles under Brian’s eyes.</p>
<p>“Go to sleep.” Dom said. “I’ll be here.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>---</strong>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Finally, Brian didn’t dream. He didn’t replay the garage again. His sleeping mind didn’t play <em>what if</em>.</p>
<p>It didn’t matter anymore.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>---</strong>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Someone was knocking so softly on the door that Brian could almost pretend that he was only dreaming.</p>
<p>The bed creaked, someone moving. Not Brian though, he was too comfortable and too warm.</p>
<p>“Dom, there’s a car out front and I… <em>oh</em>.”</p>
<p>“Everyone goes to work today. Keep them quiet downstairs. I’ll text you later. When you all come home, don’t make it a big thing. Tell them.”</p>
<p>“Of course. I’ll… I’ll make him a sandwich before I go. Dom, he looks…”</p>
<p>“I know, Mia. It’s okay though, he’ll be fine.”</p>
<p>Rustling clothes, the sound of someone rubbing their hand against fabric. Then, “Dom, I’m so happy for you.”</p>
<p>The low rumble of his reply lulled Brian back under.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>---</strong>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Someone was stroking his hair.</p>
<p>When someone stroked his hair it reminded him instantly of his mother so even though it felt good his eyes still shot open.</p>
<p>It was Dom.</p>
<p>“We back to no touching?” Dom asked him with a smile as though the answer was perfectly fine either way.</p>
<p>Brian didn’t know what to say. It was daylight now, so maybe.</p>
<p>“You realize you’ve been asleep for about eleven hours?” Dom asked him. He was sat on the bed beside Brian and, interestingly, his hand was still carding through Brian’s hair like that had ever been something he just did regularly.</p>
<p>Screw cheek strokes, hair petting was where it was at.</p>
<p>“Could have been twelve or thirteen, if you weren’t being weird while I slept.” Brian bitched mostly for the sake of it. He stretched his legs out but carefully kept his head in place.</p>
<p>Dom laughed, “I know you, that’s a long stretch not to eat. Besides,” He brought a plate into Brian’s field of vision. “I got your favorite.”</p>
<p>A tuna sandwich, no crusts.</p>
<p>“You’re forgiven,” Brian said as he grabbed one half of a sandwich and took a ridiculously big bite.</p>
<p>“I should be honest and say that Mia made that for you before she left.” Dom admitted, although that was probably to mostly see Brian’s reaction to the idea that other people knew he was here.</p>
<p>Brian shrugged, his mouth too full to speak.</p>
<p>“I’ve got an offensively red car out front my house. It’s ruining our reputations.” Dom teased him. Well, mostly teased him probably. The thing really was <em>red</em> red.</p>
<p>He swallowed then said, “I’m not married to the color. Pick something else.”</p>
<p>“Paint color goes to a team vote, you know that.” Dom said seriously, “Besides, it’s what’s under the hood that I really care about.”</p>
<p>Brian made a face to give Dom a guess about what was under the hood. It definitely wasn’t up to their standards.</p>
<p>“Well,” Dom said quietly, “That’s okay. It got you here, that’s all that matters.”</p>
<p>Brian reluctantly sat up, “You love talking shit out, let’s just do this.”</p>
<p>“I don’t <em>love</em> talking shit out. It’s just necessary.” Dom defended himself. It was pretty rich coming from a guy who literally admitted to reading books on this stuff.</p>
<p>“Okay, go for it, tell me what’s necessary.” Brian invited him.</p>
<p>Dom raised an eyebrow, “You want like, rules?”</p>
<p>When the immediate thought in Brian’s head was <em>sort of</em> he knew he was more fucked up than he’d thought originally. He tried to tell himself that it was only so he knew where he stood but the part of him that felt ripped open and untethered sort of craved the stability of whatever Dom might decree.</p>
<p>There was a funny look on Dom’s face but he started talking gamely enough, “Well, some of it doesn’t change just because you’re a legal adult now. Don’t just go in Mia or Vince’s room, always knock, that kind of shit.” He said.</p>
<p>Brian grinned, “So I shouldn’t just go lay in Vince’s bed?”</p>
<p>The idea of it – or maybe just the thought of the look on Vince’s face – had Dom laughing too. “No, although I wish I could tell you to go for it because that would be hilarious. No pranks in bedrooms. Not sure if I mentioned that before.”</p>
<p>“Is that like an official part of the rule?” Brian asked curiously.</p>
<p>“Yes, and no you don’t want to know why. So you can’t just go lay in Vince’s bed to see how he’d react. I’d remind you that you always have permission to be in here, but I think you got that.” Dom said with something darkly satisfied in his eyes. It was maybe the most predatory look Dom had ever given him but there was enough warmth in it that Brian wasn’t even remotely concerned about it.</p>
<p>After everything he had put the guy though, all the hoops Brian had unconsciously made him jump through, he deserved to be satisfied about finding Brian asleep in his bed of his own volition.</p>
<p>“I got that.” Brian confirmed quietly. He wasn’t about to explain why he was here – in this bed specifically – because he wasn’t even sure himself. Operating on instinct, mostly. And exhaustion.</p>
<p>“You got career aspirations or college plans I should know about?” Dom asked.</p>
<p>Brian snorted, “Oh yeah, I’m aiming to be a Supreme Court judge by twenty-two. Pony up for law school, man.”</p>
<p>Dom smiled but it wasn’t nearly as sarcastic as Brian’s, “Listen, like I said before, you want to go to school, we’ll make that happen. Be weird living with a lawyer but useful, I guess.”</p>
<p>“I definitely don’t want to be a lawyer so you’ll have to keep whoever you already have to help you bail Vince out again and again.” Brian shot that down easily.</p>
<p>“I stopped bailing Vince out years ago. Funnily enough, when I stopped bailing him out, he stopped getting arrested.” Dom said wryly.</p>
<p>That wasn’t surprising, “Sounds like Vince. Anyway, I don’t think I want to go to college or something. I wouldn’t know for what anyway.”</p>
<p>“You change your mind, tell me.” Dom accepted that easily. “So what do you want to do then?”</p>
<p>As a kid Brian had a few dream jobs brewing in his head. He had very seriously wanted to be a skydiving instructor for a good few years in elementary school. Drawing pictures of tiny people in very blue skies with massive colorful parachutes and comically bad clouds was one of his favorite pastimes.</p>
<p>Then he learned that he would have to log serious hours training with someone else strapped to him for a good chunk of it. He was pretty trusting of parachute manufacturers but not so trusting of some random guy that he was meant to fall through the sky with. That seemed like a lot of risk.</p>
<p>After that got thrown out, he moved on to police detective. That was mostly from seeing the cops who didn’t help his mother at all and wanting to do better than them or seeing the cops who <em>did</em> try to help his mother and wanting to be like them.</p>
<p>The more brushes with law enforcement he had after that, the less he wanted it. Twelve year old Brian had a lot more Hollywood view of the police than he’d realized. Operating lawlessly for the greater good generally wasn’t something that actually happened. Also, he’d have to work long and hard before he got to anything interesting. Directing traffic outside a Walmart on Black Friday wasn’t really where the dream went.</p>
<p>So after that, what was there?</p>
<p>He shrugged.</p>
<p>“Nothing says you have to figure that out anytime soon.” Dom said easily. “In the meanwhile, I’ve been looking to hire another mechanic for the garage. Interested?”</p>
<p>Brian narrowed his eyes, “Are you inventing that for me?”</p>
<p>“Actually, we got busier like a year and a half ago, before you ever came. I did hire a few guys but I’m not sure if you noticed – my team can be hard to get along with.” Dom looked fondly annoyed. It seemed about right. “Either they were disrespectful to Jesse or they got butthurt that Letty wasn’t falling all over herself for them or they clashed with Vince. Nobody worked out longer than a month. I was looking again when I found out about you so I let that go. There was always a chance you’d want to come to the garage and no way would I have someone who wasn’t family there that I might not be able to trust.”</p>
<p>“So you’re saying it’s my fault that you guys are always so slammed?” Brian asked with a raised eyebrow, “I guess that means I should step up and help out.”</p>
<p>Dom nodded graciously, like Brian was doing him a favor. “You’ll get paid now.”</p>
<p>His own spending money sounded nice and besides… “That means I’m paying room and board now too then.”</p>
<p><em>That</em> clearly rubbed Dom the wrong way. His face went hard in a second, “No need.”</p>
<p>“I’m not allowed to contribute to the household? How’s that a partnership?” Brian asked, scoring a low blow that he wasn’t even remotely ashamed of.</p>
<p>Dom looked like he would rather drink poison than have this conversation. “I’ll… pay you a little less than I do the others. Call that your rent.”</p>
<p>That compromise was maybe the best Brian was getting. If he physically handed Dom or Mia money each week they might have exploded.</p>
<p>“Deal.” Brian accepted happily.</p>
<p>Bringing up food money would probably give Dom a coronary so Brian quietly let it go.</p>
<p>Was this healthy communication and compromise?</p>
<p>“And your salary for the garage applies to the store too, in case you’d ever rather go with Mia.” Dom added. “We’ll just call it the same.”</p>
<p>“Oh yeah, cause I’m loads of help there.” Brian rolled his eyes, “But sure. If I get the urge, I’ll go to the store.”</p>
<p>“We installed more security,” Dom added as though Brian had been super concerned.</p>
<p>Brian shrugged, “At least being held at gunpoint was interesting.”</p>
<p>Dom didn’t look amused.</p>
<p>“You don’t ever actually have to go there. Being with one of us all day was the state’s rule. You’ll get actual shifts and shit now. A day off. Sick time, that kind of stuff.” Dom said and he seemed maybe a little less enthused about it. Probably because he liked having Brian stay with someone he trusted all day and he wasn’t happy that he had to give that up. He was still saying it though. Brian couldn’t help but appreciate it.</p>
<p>“What else?” Brian asked to change the subject.</p>
<p>His Mark shrugged, “I don’t know, Bri. I’m not your keeper. You want a curfew or something? I guess my only thing is please tell if you’re going out late. I’ll do the same for you.”</p>
<p>Brian wasn’t sure what he wanted Dom to say about rules. It just felt safer to know where all the boundary lines were so he didn’t cross anything and piss anyone off.</p>
<p>“Okay,” He agreed reluctantly. He’d probably just try and keep to how things had been before, just with more money and the ability to drive. To hide the awkwardness, he took another bite of his sandwich. Force Dom to lead this pow-wow.</p>
<p>Dom stared at him evenly like he completely saw through Brian’s attempt to deflect. “Anything about your decision to come home you want to tell me about?”</p>
<p>Brian chewed slowly, giving himself another minute.</p>
<p>That made Dom quirk an eyebrow but otherwise he just waited.</p>
<p>“Wasn’t so much a decision,” Brian shrugged once his mouth wasn’t full, “Just kind of ended up here. I…”</p>
<p>Dom nodded encouragingly but he didn’t fill the silence, which Brian appreciated now that he had actually started talking. Dom seemed eerily good at knowing when to talk for Brian and when to let him do it himself.</p>
<p>Dom seemed eerily good at figuring out what Brian needed in general.</p>
<p>“I think you were right.” Brian admitted, “About most of it. But especially about… I guess I did think that once I hit the finish line, everything would be better. And it isn’t. It’s maybe even worse.”</p>
<p>There was concern in Dom’s dark eyes, “Worse how?”</p>
<p>Brian almost shrugged before he realized he’d done that like ten times already. He didn’t like the words <em>panic attack</em> but he wasn’t sure how else to explain, “There’s nothing else, you know? Like I did all the bad shit because I had to. I powered through and now I’m done it’s all… I’m explaining bad, I know. I don’t really get why but I keep… Like my heart races for no reason. And then I can’t breathe and then I can’t see. And there’s nothing wrong in that minute, you know? Like I’m done with juvie and I’m done with my dad and you’re not something bad after all, so what business do I have freaking out? Except I keep doing it.”</p>
<p>“Makes sense.” Dom said quietly, “You said it yourself. You <em>had</em> to power through the bad stuff. So maybe now that you’re safe, your head won’t let you keep pushing everything away anymore. Maybe now that you can, you have to deal with all the old shit. And that’s okay, we’ll figure it out together.”</p>
<p>“I hope you’re wrong, that sounds fucking awful.” Brian laughed and ducked his head to avoid Dom’s eyes. “So why am I here? You, I guess. You like… steady me, and yeah I feel dumb saying that out loud.”</p>
<p>Dom reached out for him, hand to the side of his cheek to coax him to look back up at him. “Don’t feel dumb,” His hand was so gentle and even though Brian knew for a fact that he could ruin a person with it, he wasn’t afraid, “You steady me too.”</p>
<p>The tenderness in his eyes was hard to scoff at but Brian did his best to make a face, “I don’t see how.”</p>
<p>“You need me to be that person. I try to be what the team needs or what Mia needs but sometimes it feels so fake. Fake and claustrophobic. But you… I want to be whatever you need. You make me think twice. You make me plan better. You made me grow up and let go of the last little bit of that angry person who came out of jail without a father and with more responsibilities than I knew what to do with.” Dom explained as his hand slid down to Brian’s neck. His thumb traced Brian’s pulse and the motion seemed to ease some nervous energy out of the both of them. “I felt like such a failure when I got out of there. I’d abandoned Mia when she needed me most, made some of my aunts and uncles step in to keep our lives going while I was gone because I couldn’t control myself. Everything was a mess and I was too. It got better but those feelings of having fucked it all up didn’t go away. Not until you.”</p>
<p>It was nice hearing that he had done something for Dom that wasn’t just making him occasionally happy with weird little victories. It made him feel less pathetic for, well, <em>everything</em> pretty much.</p>
<p>The arm Dom had extended out to touch him was the one that held his Mark. Brian’s eyes caught on it and he saw Dom catch the reaction.</p>
<p>He used to avoid it at all costs.</p>
<p>This time, he grabbed Dom’s hand and eased it down from his neck into his lap, so his Mark was exposed to the both of them. “In juvie, the second time, I was looking at mine and I wondered if you saw the same thing I always have and then I felt like an ass for wondering because it’s not like I ever asked. I probably would have bit your head off if you had tried to tell me.”</p>
<p>Dom seemed like he could barely breathe, “What do you think it is?” He whispered.</p>
<p>Brian reached out and Dom’s breath literally caught. He traced a finger over the swirling black lines. “Like the fog after a fast car cuts through it.”</p>
<p>“<em>Jesus</em>,” Dom let out with a shuddering breath, “When I was five, my father and I were driving around, just the two of us for fun. It was raining and dark and I saw a black car in front of us speed by. The rain and the fog in our headlights went wild. I was mesmerized, Brian. I said to my father that my Mark looked just like that and he agreed. He said that maybe it meant my Mark would be like him and I, in love with cars and speed. It was the first time I had really thought about what you would be like. That you were an actual person who would like things and we would share things together.”</p>
<p>Brian laughed as much as he was currently able to, which wasn’t really much but it was enough to lighten the mood a little so he was okay with how wobbly his voice sounded, “You realize it’s been speeding cars that have built like, our entire thing right? That’s how I ended up in juvie, which is how I ended up with you. That was literally how the guy there tried to get me excited about you, by telling me that you owned a garage and maybe you’d let me work on the cars sometime. And then driving too fast with you and then my car and then me fucking up with my car. If I hadn’t done that, I don’t know that we’d be sitting here like this now.”</p>
<p>“And then the viciously red car out front, bringing you back to me.” Dom added. “Yeah, I guess that sounds about right for us.”</p>
<p>“Something out there looked at the two of us with a healthy love of metal and an unhealthy disregard for speed limits and said yep, stamp ‘em as a set.” Brian was maybe giggling. He would deny it if Dom called him out for it but he’d be sort of lying.</p>
<p>Except Dom wasn’t looking at him like he was being a thirteen year old girl, he was looking at Brian like he was something wonderful.</p>
<p>He had never, in his entire life, been something wonderful to anyway. The closest had maybe been his mother but for her he was more something to give her hope. More of a symbol than an actual person.</p>
<p>Brian had laid everything bare to his Mark and Dom <em>still</em> thought he was worth something.</p>
<p>That was pretty big.</p>
<p>“Thank you.” Dom said.</p>
<p>It was a loaded question but Brian asked it anyway. “For what?”</p>
<p>Dom’s answer was simple but it was everything.</p>
<p>
  <em>“For trusting me.” </em>
</p>
<p> </p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>I'm tentatively plotting a sequel but I cannot make any guarantees, especially about when it would be ready. You're all welcome to float your ideas my way - if I know roughly what you guys would like, I can try and see what I can work in to the idea I've got brewing :) </p>
<p>Thank you again for all of your support. I am dying to know what you guys think of the last chapter! Please let me know!</p>
<p>Thank you for reading!!!</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
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